[Katori]
[GEN] EXCERPT FROM THE MEMOIRS OF LIFE AND DEATH
readerofasaph
Excerpt from the Memoirs of Life and Death
by Touya Akira
Sami Mansei (early 8th century) -
Our life in this world--
to what shall I compare it?
It is like a boat
rowing out at break of day,
leaving not a trace behind.
I was a boy when I first heard the name of Fujiwara no Sai. Looking back, it was that day which marked the end of my childhood.
My father's students brought the news to the school, which back then was a plain hall of limestone not far from the city gates, about a ten-minute walk away from the agora. It was my habit when my lessons were done for the day to spend afternoons tutoring there. The school's students were generally not aspiring mages, - those, if they had no master of their own, usually trained at the Guild - nor were they nobles with the wealth to command an Adept's teaching services for such paltry objectives as rudimentary incantation or a first-level atari. They were rather, men of the middle classes with some education and the desire for more. Some were tradesmen, some landowners, and others artisans; there were even a few wealthy slaves. Their igo was on the whole unremarkable. I did not go there in order to challenge my strength; I went there to learn the art of shidougo, which in its own way refined my spellcasting. It was part of Father's grooming me for the responsibilities of being an igo master.
But I was challenged that day. More than challenged - I was shaken to the core of my being.
“I met a child and a young man in the agora,” said a student to Ishikawa, on his way out. “They were searching for a place to practice igo, so I directed them here.”
“Oh?” Ishikawa smiled. “They had no idea where to find a school of magic? How quaint! Are they newcomers to the city?”
“Well, it's hard to say.” The student looked puzzled. He was an old man, and a former member of the tribunal. Few people knew the city better than he did. “The child is ordinary enough, his manner of speech seemed local. It was his companion who was unusual: loose white robes, and hair worn long and braided. I haven't seen men dress so effeminately since I was a child myself.” He shook his head. “In any event, I thought they would have made it here by now. Perhaps they changed their minds.”
“I've seen no children here today, besides Master Akira,” said Ishikawa, turning to smile at me. She had been part of the Touya household since before I was born, and promoted to the running of the school five years ago. “Wouldn't it be nice, Master Akira, to see someone your own age here? Of course, there is no child out there who could match your abilities.”
I looked up from the table at which I was studying a tome of tsumego incantations. “I'm content here,” I said. “Everyone has been very kind to me.”
Ishikawa tsk-ed at me, a sound of exasperation and fondness. I smiled and went back to my book. Familiar moments, the naïve complacency of childhood.
They came about an hour later, when I had just finished instructing a new student in the principles of uchikomi attack spells. A boy about my age, wearing a dark tunic, the forelocks of his hair dyed bright to contrast with natural black. He propped his elbows on the counter as he greeted Ishikawa. “Hello! Can we have an igo duel here?”
She seemed taken aback by his abruptness, but bowed graciously. “Of course you may. Do you intend to battle each other?”
The boy exchanged glances with the young man at his side. Ishikawa studied them curiously, as did several other students who were close by. They presented a strange picture to us: a young boy of the city, neither a mage-in-training nor a noble's son, expressing an interest in the esoteric arts, and a figure in flowing white linen, long-haired, delicate-faced - the appearance of Fujiwara no Sai is well-known, these days. Back then it was unfamiliar, and striking.
He clasped his paper fan to his chest and bowed low to Ishikawa - causing the onlookers to murmur - and introduced his name and Shindou's. “If it is permitted, my lady, I should like to act as Hikaru's Mind.”
It was more common then than it is now, this use of a Mind to stand beside the the duellist and direct him as he battled. Usually an instructor took on the role when an inexperienced student was learning how to duel, and following this convention we assumed that Sai was Shindou's teacher. It was a correct, if not precise, assessment.
“Ah, a learner!” Ishikawa seemed charmed by Fujiwara; indeed, people generally were. “I'll see about finding an appropriate opponent for you.”
She glanced at the slate upon which she recorded the day's attendance, running her thumb down the list of names. But Shindou had already turned to look at me.
“Oh good, you're my age!” He walked towards me. “I was thinking I'd have to battle some old man.”
We exchanged bows, with Ishikawa's disapproving frown upon us. It was not that she did not trust me to duel appropriately with beginners - she had seen me do so, many times - so I presumed that the disapprobation was directed at Shindou, for his lack of protocol, and perhaps at me for allowing it. But seeing another child at the school was a novelty for me.
“The duelling room is at the back of the hall,” I said, leading the way for the both of them. “Standard wards are already set. We cast lots to determine who uses the Black Compendium and who uses the White.”
Shindou had halted midstep. “The Black Compendium?”
“The set of spells, Hikaru,” said Fujiwara. “Remember that in a duel one is only allowed to use half of the possible spells - either the Black spells, or the White.”
It was my turn to be apprehensive. While it was clear that the boy was a learner, what manner of igo practitioner did not know about the Black and White Compendia?
“You may take the black,” I said, as we entered the room. The black side was generally stronger in those days - this was before we revised the Compendia to redistribute the offensive and defensive type spells more evenly.
My confidence in Shindou did not increase as I watched Fujiwara coach him on every small basic from positioning and posture, to the art of chalk diagramming. Even with a Mind to direct him, was he truly ready for a duel? Fujiwara seemed like an experienced master, although a little archaic in manner of dress and convention - then again, many masters were - but nevertheless, I doubted the wisdom of his sending a pupil in to fight so early.
“Would you like a handicap?” I asked. Shindou made a face.
“Whatever for? We're the same age, aren't we?”
I blinked. “...I suppose so.”
He looked to Fujiwara continually for cues, as we took our opening positions and again, exchanged bows. I nodded at him. “You’re black, so you should move first.”
“The first Star spell,” murmured Fujiwara. “Fourth diagram and Fourth utterance.” He indicated the shape in midair with his fan. Shindou knelt down and painstakingly chalked it out on the floor, and then repeated the syllables that Fujiwara spoke to him.
It was an adequate shape, if unsightly, and the first spell of hoshi was a solid opening. The lines of power flared silver, and then black as they headed towards my body. I spread my fingers in the pattern of a white shield, and began reciting the words of a counterspell. The fan was already turning, drawing new sigils for Shindou to copy.
A duel of igo appears far more sedate than the alternate forms of magic. Shougi, for instance, is a fight to first blood; strong attack and solid defense are of the utmost importance. Igo duels are about artistry as much as they are about battle; it has been held throughout history that no system of spellcasting comes closer to the beauty of the gods.
Rather than seeking to overwhelm with power, then, we sought instead to thwart the other’s patterns, determining whose design would eventually be dominant. I had a significant speed advantage; Shindou was slow, and Fujiwara often had to repeat his instructions. And yet, his joseki formed inexorably - the concatenation of spell after spell, shakily executed by Shindou but surprisingly steady as they built up, criss-crossed the room in dark magical shapes that intertwined with my own structures, blocking them, complementing them.
It was thirty minutes into the duel before I realised that I was losing.
No, not losing, but only because Fujiwara was not attempting to win.
I looked across the room, mind suddenly in turmoil. Fujiwara was deep in concentration, again reminding Shindou of the correct incantation for a connecting spell.
The spell struck, and my komoku formation swayed, but did not unravel. Indeed, Fujiwara was not trying to defeat me. It was shidougo. He was teaching me.
If this were not a duelling room, with all the magical safeguards attached. If Fujiwara were seriously challenging me…
…then I would be dead.
~~~~~
From the time I turned four, Father taught me to face my death.
It was the first birthday present I remember him giving me (my infancy and earlier years are not so clear) - the door to the igo room opening, and inside, the smooth stone floor with the edges of the duelling area marked out in colored tiles. My father bent down, his dark robe brushing against the floor, and with one hand pressed against my back, guided me gently into the correct position. He then stood, walked to the opposite corner, and bowed to me.
I bowed back, as clumsy as you may imagine a four-year-old to be. Then he told me to cast a spell, and I did. So it was that I lost my first duel that afternoon, the first loss of thousands. When I had conceded my father showed me the wards set about the room, their sigils glowing in black and white fire.
They were designed, he explained, to prevent duels from becoming lethal. Never forget that magic can kill. Never forget, that as a true practitioner of igo, you must be prepared to die.
I do not think I understood him then, young as I was. But I had many subsequent years in which to learn the lesson.
Four days after I lost to Fujiwara, my father held his study group at our home. I had attended those weekly sessions for a year and a half by that point; they were small gatherings, confined to those igo practitioners whom Father had personally mentored. Most prominent among them was Ogata Seiji, who had been studying with my father for nearly half a century.
He arrived early that evening, while my Father was still out performing a kifu to reinforce the city’s aqueducts, and was shown into the sitting room by one of the slave-girls. When I brought a tray of fruit to him, he was smoking a cigar, studying a leatherbound book lying open in his lap.
I greeted him, and his eyes flickered upwards in casual recognition. “Akira. I heard that you had an interesting week.”
Frowning, I placed the tray on the end table next to where he was sitting, before taking a seat myself.
“I met Shindou Hikaru today,” he said.
A cold frisson went through my body. “Was Fujiwara with him?” I asked.
“A small man with a lovely face, and hair like black silk. Yes, I saw him.” Ogata lifted the cigar to his lips and breathed in. “Do you not want to know where, or how?”
I was too familiar with Master Ogata to not know when he was baiting me, but learning of Fujiwara’s whereabouts was the most important thing. “Where did you meet them?”
“At the Children’s Igo Tournament. They attempted to participate but were disqualified. Your father met them too.” He was looking at me to how I would react. He had often done this since the first time I duelled Ashiwara to a draw, although it had taken me several months to notice.
“Did you watch them-“ Did you watch Fujiwara duel, I wanted to ask. But the words hesitated on my tongue, and before I could find my voice a slave had come in to announce the arrival of my father and the other study group members.
Ashiwara, upon entering the room, walked over to the couch I was on and ruffled my hair. “Hullo, Akira, it’s been a while! Have you finally decided to take the Journeyman exams?”
I had been on the verge of deciding in favour of the Guild’s exams, at last week’s meeting. But now… “No, I won’t be taking them this year.”
“Huh? That’s strange. I thought we’d decided that you were more than ready to take them.” Ashiwara peered at me bemusedly, but I was more aware of the sharp interest in Ogata’s gaze.
“I can’t take them. Because I discovered that I’m not ready to die yet.”
Ashiwara sighed, and sat down next to me. “Sometimes, I just don’t understand you! I suppose there’s no hurry for you to take the exam, as it is.”
Ogata adjusted his glasses. “Should I be charmed by your youthfulness, Akira? Or should I fear you?”
My father said, “Akira will choose his own path in igo. When he is ready to walk the road of the masters, we will be there to welcome him, and guide him.”
That brought an end to the topic, and very soon we were deep in discussion of a new variant of the keima spell that we’d seen Master Gama exhibit in a kifu two weeks ago. But my mind remained distracted, thinking about Fujiwara no Sai.
~~~~~
Study group ran late, and I did not get the opportunity to ask my father about Fujiwara that evening. Early the next day he departed for a tournament that was being held in a neighbouring city, and did not come back until a week later. I was left to struggle with my own emotions, which seemed to have intensified in the wake of Ogata's announcement.
By this point I had replayed the duel endlessly in my mind, tracing the path from joseki to yose repeatedly as if etching the battle into my memory would reveal something to me that I did not already know. I considered, too, the moves I had made at each step: if I had done this - if I had cast that - would it have made any difference? My logic said that it would not, that Fujiwara was at some level above me, one I would not be able to reach for many years. But some part of me insisted that it would. In the infinite possibilities of igo everything is made possible. I have always believed this, and this is why I have never, in a duel, let my guard down against even the rankest amateur.
Being acquainted with Shindou Hikaru is a powerful deterrent to carelessness.
But at the time it was Fujiwara who was foremost on my mind. I wondered what it would be like to fight a true duel against him, to see that practised hand making sigils not with a powerless fan, but with chalk and light and magic. How much more powerful would he be then? Would I be courageous enough, to go up against that kind of skill?
I was afraid to face Fujiwara in battle. But because of that, I knew that I had to.
That weekend, I visited the temple district in the hope that I could find out something more about Fujiwara. I had a hunch that I would find something there, based on the archaic style of Fujiwara's igo - something that became more obvious the longer I considered the duel I had fought with Shindou. Fujiwara's incantations were old-fashioned, his style of poetry reminiscent of a bygone era. Some of the diagrams he had shown Shindou were no longer in use. Possibly, then, he was far older than he looked. The city's temples, the oldest repository of magical knowledge in the civilized world, seemed a likely place to search.
Perhaps it was serendipity, that I heard Shindou's voice as I was passing in front of the Honinbou Temple. But I do not think it was.
“You lived inside this place for forty years? That sounds awful.”
“It's not as bad as it seems. There are large courtyards, you know, beyond the main temple. Torajirou and I used to take walks there on sunny days.”
“Hmm. You probably sat there and talked about igo all the time.”
“Well....” I had already begun running towards them, and could see Fujiwara flushing pink at Shindou's words, as I drew closer.
“Master Fujiwara!” He turned, wide-eyed, as I came to a stop in front of him; my heartbeat seemed to race through my head as he focused his gaze on me. “I've been looking for you.”
Shindou spoke first. “Hey, you're Touya Akira! What are you doing here?”
He was leaning against a tree trunk, arms folded across his chest, but there was genuine curiosity in his eyes. Something about his presence both agitated me and yet, gave me enough composure to take a deep breath, and speak to Fujiwara:
“I would like a match against you.”
I did not understand why Fujiwara appeared uncomfortable, and looked across at Shindou, who unfolded his arms and shrugged: “Why not? It's not like we had anything planned today, anyway.” He straightened himself and walked to Fujiwara's side. “Where do you want to battle?” he asked me. “Back at the school?”
I frowned. “I.... just to make myself clear. I wanted to duel against you, Master Fujiwara. A true duel.”
An expression I could not quite read - although I sensed that it was unhappy - came over Shindou's face, and then was gone. Fujiwara's gaze shifted over to him, and lingered anxiously for a moment, before returning to me.
“Please, call me Sai. There's no need to be formal. As to your request, Touya - I'm afraid that the only way I can meet you in battle is as Hikaru's Mind.”
“I don't understand.” I looked from one to the other. By now, confusion had gained ascendancy over the crushing anticipation that had dominated my chest minutes earlier. “Are you refusing my request?”
Shindou looked away pointedly, and said nothing. Fujiwara flicked his fan open, but kept it in his hand, hanging down by his side.
“I am sorry, Touya. I am afraid I have no magical power of my own. The only way I can meet your challenge is through Shindou.”
There was a long silence as I took in his statement, tried to understand it. “That's impossible,” I said finally. There wasn't a single human in the world who did not have magical power. How could Fujiwara have this much igo knowledge and yet not be able to perform it for himself?
He brought his fan up and held it outwards in an invitational gesture. “Examine us, please. Use your senses, and see the kifu that binds me and Hikaru together.”
There seemed no alternative but to take his suggestion, and so I murmured the incantation that would enable me to see lines of power.
“Not that one,” said Fujiwara. “A deeper one, Touya. One that enables you to see hidden kifu.” He spoke another incantation out loud and told me to repeat it after him. It was full of ancient words, some of which I did not know; I had to listen carefully before saying the sentences myself. Once finished, I looked at him and Shindou, and my breath caught.
Delicate, ornate shapes clung to the entirety of Fujiwara's body - fine magical lines, barely visible even with the help of the spell I had just cast. Each form melded into the next one seamlessly in a complex geometrical formation that covered his skin and even extended into the air around him, threads of black and white light spreading outwards like a constellation. And the longest and most intricate strands of magic were tied to Shindou Hikaru. I could see them, the weavings that bound their bodies together: Shindou's hands to Fujiwara's hands, Shindou's mouth to Fujiwara's mouth. There was even a bright, loosely-shaped length of magic connecting their hearts.
“So now you see,” said Fujiwara gently, after I had been staring for some time.
“How did this happen?” I asked, when I finally managed to speak.
“Not by my choice,” muttered Shindou.
Fujiwara looked at the two of us, and smiled. “Let's go somewhere else, where we can sit down,” he suggested. “Then I will tell you the whole story.”
~~~~~
It may seem strange, nowadays, that there ever was a time when Fujiwara no Sai's joseki were not studied, or his story not known; but indeed, such was the situation for most of history. Shindou's star has risen these last decades, my father's too, and the weight of their igo has carried Fujiwara's name with it. But back then all this was far in the future. And the Honinbou Temple had not yet opened its secrets. That morning, sitting in the formal gardens of the Assembly,in a grove surrounded by concealing vines, I was the first person outside the Shindou household to learn Fujiwara's story.
Because it is a story that will be familiar to most readers, I shall only touch on those points here that have heretofore not been general knowledge. In his first life, his true life, one might say, Fujiwara served as court magician in a distant empire. He was betrayed into a shameful loss in a duel with a fellow courtier, when his opponent tampered with the wards of the arena, and so lost his position within the palace. As part of his punishment for losing, the emperor ordered that his powers be stripped from him. He was subjected to a kifu so arcane and dangerous that the knowledge of it has been struck from the history books, and after being thus handicapped, was banished from the country.
Half-crazed with grief, Fujiwara wandered from land to land in search of a magician who might break the spell that sealed his powers. But many years passed, and no such person was found, and the enchantment itself seemed as strong as it had been the day it was placed on him. At last, driven to despair, he walked to the banks of a great river, and prayed to the gods that in the afterlife he might once again walk the path of igo. Then he fell into the river, intending to drown himself.
“As I lost consciousness, a bright light surrounded me. It is hard to describe. The water and the light closed around me, and I felt as if I was suffocating. After that...I dreamed.” Fujiwara stared down at his fan, which he had laid outspread on the stone table where we were sitting. “Sometimes I dreamt about my childhood, sometimes about drowning. But mostly I dreamt about igo, of casting spells and laying out kifu. There was no sense of the passage of time. I only knew that I dreamt, and then...the dreams passed, and again, there was white and black light. I was aware of my body floating in the middle of a lake. And standing before me was Kuwahara Torajirou.”
“Kuwahara Torajirou - you mean the Honinbou?” I asked. Throughout history, the Honinbou priests have produced some of the city's most renowned igo practitioners, but Shusaku, as most will know, is the most revered of them all. Hearing Fujiwara's story, I felt like I was listening to a myth, a legend of igo that my Father had omitted to teach me.
He nodded. “I was bonded to him for fifty years, the same way I am to Hikaru now. Our magics were linked together, and when he cast igo, I too, spellcast with him. I'm afraid that we were not being completely honest with you. I do not act merely as Hikaru's Mind, you see. My own power runs through Hikaru's spells too. It is less than what I could do with Torajirou, back then, but more than Hikaru could do with his own magic.”
“And when Honinbou Shusaku passed away...?”
“When he realised he was dying, he brought me back to the lake, so that I could return to my sleep.”
“He was sleeping at the bottom of the lake when I found him.”
“You stepped on me when you found me, Hikaru,” said Fujiwara reproachfully.
“I've already apologised for that!”
Mentally I calculated the passage of time. It had been nearly two centuries since Honinbou Shusaku's death, and if I was correct, more than a thousand since the the empire that Fujiwara described had fallen. Yet Fujiwara himself appeared to be no more than twenty or twenty-five years old.
Shindou and Fujiwara appeared to have digressed into an argument, the details of which eluded me at first. It seemed to revolve around history lessons with Shindou's tutor, but quickly changed to the subject of igo:
“We practise magic everyday! Two days ago we duelled that insei, what's his name - Waya.” Shindou folded his arms again, and turned his back to Fujiwara.
“But then we got banned from the school because you made fun of that bald man!”
“It was better than using magic like you wanted to do! With you it's always igo, more igo. I'm so tired of it. Although-” He cast Fujiwara a sidelong glance. “I wouldn't mind doing more duels if--”
“What?” demanded Fujiwara. It was striking to see the contrast in his behaviour towards me and Shindou. While his manner was always gentle, his hands always expressive, when Fujiwara spoke to me he spoke as an igo master, with grace and authority. With Shindou it had more of an air of two childhood friends playing together.
“Well, don't people always place bets on the matches, at magic tournaments? I could use the money.”
It took a moment for what Shindou was saying to sink into my head, and then I clenched one fist.
“Hikaru! How could you think of something like that!”
“Oh come on, why do you have to take this so seriously? I have to get something out of this as well, you know.” He blinked, startled, as I stood and looked at him in the eye. I felt a fury I scarcely understood at his indifference, at how little he seemed to care for Fujiwara or the art of igo.
“Fight against me again,” I said. “Both of you.”
~~~~~
The second time I lost to Shindou Hikaru and Fujiwara no Sai, I walked home and entered the igo room. There, I painstakingly recreated the duel I had just fought, spell by spell. Then I erased the magic and then recreated the first duel I had had against them.
As had happened last time, I could think of nothing else for days. Memories of both duels - images, spells, diagrams - cycled through my mind. Shindou's spellcasting was better than before. His incantations were fluent, and he no longer had to look to Fujiwara constantly for cues. But that had not been the striking difference between the first match and the second. The difference had been Fujiwara.
The second time, Fujiwara had shown no mercy. And in his relentless exquisite black patterns, I had seen my death.
When my father came back, bringing a new tournament title with him, it was already time for the next study group meeting. And I was not the only who had news to bring of Fujiwara. Shimano, a young noble, was probably the strongest igo spellcaster among those of the city who did not practice it as a profession, and generally held to have the abilities of a lower-level Adept.
He had been challenged by Shindou and Fujiwara two days earlier, at a local arena, and had accepted the challenge, and lost.
“They were amazingly strong. Perhaps even as strong as you are, Master Touya.”
My father did not answer, merely chalked a sigil onto the slate in front of him. It began to glow white.
Ogata said, “They insisted on duelling as a pair, just as they did with Akira? And the boy Shindou was unnaturally strong? There is something very strange occurring here.”
“Actually--” They looked at me, and I told them my story. When I was done, Ogata looked pensive.
“That's - a remarkable story, if it can be believed. There are books that say such things were possible. But I've never seen an example of it.”
“Could it be reversed?” asked Ashiwara. “It seems quite hard on the boy.” I looked at him, and he shifted uncomfortably. “Well, you know - I don't think children should be made to pursue igo if they do not enjoy it. From what Akira said, it seems as if he does not enjoy it. And a soul-bond is not an easy thing to live with.”
“A kifu that has lasted a thousand years? Do we have any hope of lifting it?” Ogata glanced at my father, who had already overlaid the sigil with the Nineteenth Diagram.
“Without seeing for myself, I cannot know,” Father replied.
He refused to speak any more on the subject at that gathering. But when the others were gone, he called me to his study, and asked me to tell him in great detail everything about my two encounters with Shindou and Fujiwara.
A fortnight passed before we spoke on the topic again. I returned home from the igo school on a rainy evening to find my father in the library, seated at his desk with vast stacks of books piled around him. I went closer, and saw what they were: books on kifu, on curses and blessings, on bindings and how to remove them.
My father was writing a letter. He looked up upon hearing the sound of my footsteps, and inclined his head in greeting. “I duelled Shindou Hikaru and Fujiwara no Sai today,” he said.
Even now, I could not think of the two of them without my emotions being disquieted. “What happened?” I asked, both wanting and dreading the answer.
“The boy Shindou ran out of the arena before the first joseki was complete. We were unable to complete the battle.”
“But you saw their igo. What did you think?”
He glanced at me, and then continued writing with his pen-brush. “It was flawless. The spellcasting and strategy of an igo master. With so few spells to observe, I was unable to read beyond that.”
I wondered then, what that opening joseki had looked like; I would not have described Shindou Hikaru's spellcasting as flawless by any measure of the word. I opened my mouth to question further, but then saw my father's face, and remained silent.
He had dipped his pen-brush into his inkpot, but had not removed it, and his hand remained in that half-finished gesture as he stared into space, appearing to be deep in thought.
“It would not have been a fair duel,” he said.
~~~~~
It was no surprise to any of us when Master Ogata sought out Fujiwara and issued him a challenge. By the time this happened it was summer, and there was not an igo practitioner in the city who had not heard of the pair and their story. There were even people coming from neighbouring cities and lands to challenge them. And they had never lost so far. They had defeated renowned amateurs like Kadowaki and even humiliated master practitioners like Gokiso. There were even rumors that the great masters of the city, like Ichiryuu and my father, had avoided facing them for fear of being defeated.
“I thought of challenging them, you know,” said Ashiwara. He had come to visit me at the school, and we were having a an informal match using restricted Compendia.
I drew the 3rd Diagram in order to cast a komoku. “Why don't you?”
“Ah, that's because. Because.” Ashiwara scratched the back of his head. “Well, they're so busy these days! There's always someone or the other trying to challenge them. Insei, foreigners, young nobles. Mind you, it's fascinating just watching. Fujiwara's patterns, of course, but even Shindou's spellcasting technique is really good by now. Almost the level of an insei's, I'd say.”
I knew. I had been watching their matches as well, whenever my time and duties allowed, although I had not spoken to them since the day they told me their story. Once Fujiwara had spotted me in an amphitheatre, sitting amongst the audience for their match against a foreign igo master, and waved. But Shindou had turned away, refusing to look at me, and for that reason among others I had found myself reluctant to approach them since.
“Besides, it'd be better to challenge Fujiwara once they cast the unbinding, wouldn't it? Isn't that what you're waiting for? How is your father going with the development of the unbinding spell?”
“I'm not sure. Father has never talked to me about it. But I heard the Kisei talking to Master Morishita about it, and he said that it was only a matter of sorting out minor details now.” I did not, at that point, know how or when my father had approached Fujiwara and Shindou with the idea of the unbinding, only that it had been done at some point. I did not want to broach the subject with my father until he chose to himself.
“But Master Ogata has gone ahead and challenged them anyway. Ha ha, I bet he was just impatient.”
“Perhaps.”
Ogata came to visit our home that evening. It was a fine day, so Father and I sat with him in the courtyard, watching the sun go down behind the outline of the city. The slaves brought sweetmeats and a decanter of wine. Ogata poured himself a glass and drank it in one gulp.
“I heard that you lost,” Father said.
Ogata reached for the decanter again, then changed his mind and lit a cigar instead. “It was worth it. His igo is strong - better than strong. His igo is magnificent.” He glanced at me. “Not just Fujiwara, you know. Shindou Hikaru too. Four months ago the child barely knew what igo was. But he's keeping up with Fujiwara's patterns, and easily most of the time.”
My lips tightened, and I looked ahead, avoiding Ogata's scrutiny. “He doesn't care about the art. Somebody like that can't possibly have true strength.”
Ogata shrugged, but did not seem inclined to disagree with me. There was a dreamy look in his eyes.
My father looked first at him, and then at me. “Either way,” he said, “we will have no way of ascertaining the boy's talent, or Fujiwara's true abilities, until the unbinding.”
“I wonder if it is necessary. Why tamper with the gift of the gods?”
“It is what they both want.”
“And what you want too, doubtless.” This time Ogata did take the decanter. His second glass of wine was swallowed even more quickly than the first one. “Is is the pursuit of igo sacred or profane, I wonder?”
~~~~~
He came to me one week before the unbinding was scheduled to be performed, walking past Ishikawa with the usual lack of ceremony.
“Can we talk?” he asked, standing by the table where I was demonstrating sigils on a slate. Fujiwara hovered some yards behind, looking anxious.
I bowed my head in apology to the student I was teaching, and glanced up at Shindou. “Certainly, after school is done for that day. About an hour.”
“That's fine.” He turned. “Maybe we should get something to eat then, Sai--” But they had been recognised, and were soon surrounded and deluged with requests for matches. In the end it was I who had to wait for them to finish their second duel.
“What did you wish to speak with me about?” I asked, when he and Fujiwara came out of the duelling room.
“I don't know. I just wanted to talk to you, that's all.” When I stared at him, he reddened. “Is that so strange?”
It seemed out of keeping for Shindou to be feeling awkward, and I regarded him for some time before finally saying: “Well, would you prefer to talk here? Or at my home?”
Fujiwara was using his fan to cover his mouth. “Perhaps somewhere else would be better,” he suggested. “Hikaru, that place would be good, wouldn't it?”
For once Fujiwara took the lead, taking us through the streets to a quieter area of the city where I rarely went, lower down in the valley, lined with long rows of flat-roofed stone houses. They led me down a cobbled lane ending in a low wall, which we clambered up and walked along in order to get to the rooftop of an adjacent house.
“We come here a lot,” said Shindou, sitting down cross-legged on the rooftop. “It's a good place - nobody recognises us in this part of the city.”
I had not stopped to consider the effects that notoriety must have had on his life. “It must have been difficult for you.”
Shindou shrugged. “It'll be less annoying once we have the unbinding.” Again that discontented expression, the one I could not decipher, passed over his face. But then he looked at Fujiwara - who was busy peering at the surrounding houses and valley with bright eyes - and his features smoothened into composure again.
It was curiously comfortable, sitting there with the two of them - with hindsight, I would say that it was the one chance I had to participate in their closeness, in the bond between Shindou Hikaru and Fujiwara no Sai that was magical but also more than that. We stayed there quietly, the three of us, watching the daylight grow dim. The air grew cooler, and the sound of birds and insects more prominent as the noise of wheels and footsteps became less so. There were stars coming into the sky and a low-lying gibbous moon.
It was not until the sun disappeared completely and we had stood up, preparing to to return home, that Shindou finally asked me his question. “When the unbinding is done, will you have a duel with me? Just me, I mean.”
Fujiwara was behind me; I felt, rather than saw, him smiling.
“Of course,” I said. “I would be happy to do so.”
None of us knew how long it would be before I could keep my agreement.
~~~~~
And now we come to the part of the story that is difficult to tell.
The unbinding was held on the day before the autumnal equinox. It was decided that it should be performed at the Pavilion of Profound Darkness, located next to the Guild headquarters; Shindou's family were all present, as well as the principal workers of the unbinding: my father, Ogata Seiji, and Ichiryuu Kisei. Kuwabara Honinbou was there, as the other preeminent priest of the city.
News of the unbinding had not been widely circulated, but there were spectators nevertheless, and they filled up the courtyard; Kuwabara Honinbou was obliged to chalk a barrier in order to keep them away. The appropriate diagrams and sigils were drawn across the pavilion, the wards were set, and those not directly participating in the working such as my Shindou's parents and myself were instructed to stay outside of the wards. It was an open pavilion and circular, originally designed for duelling, and afforded a good view of the magical activity being undertaken within it.
As they started, my father once more turned to Shindou and Fujiwara. “I would like to make sure before we begin that you are at peace of mind about what we are doing. Do you have any doubts about unbinding this enchantment?
Shindou looked at Fujiwara's face, and then back at Father.
“No,” he said, voice determined. “We'll do it.”
They began by unveiling the enchantment on the two. The Kisei uttered an incantation, Master Ogata formed a sigil, and the lines of power flared. And I saw it again for the last time, the kifu that bound the two together. It is the greatest spell I have seen in my lifetime, and probably the greatest I will ever see.
Another diagram followed. An incantation. Another barrier went up, this time obscuring our vision. There was power radiating from the pavillion, visible even to the unaided eye.
It took perhaps an hour. The crowd began to disperse, bored by the lack of apparent activity; the ones trained in magic lingered, aware that the enchantments being effected here were something one could live a mage's lifetime and not see. We watched magical power wax and wane and drift outwards, unable to guess what manner of spell within was generating those outbursts of energy.
Master Ogata tells me that to the last moment as they worked there was no wavering, no false step, no sign up till the last possible moment that the unbinding would be anything other than successful. for me, I only know that I waited, and watched, until I saw the barrier flicker, a sign that it was being prepared to be taken down and that the working was coming to an end. It did not flicker long, perhaps a minute, before disappearing. We all saw it, then.
Shindou Hikaru lay at the centre of the Pavilion, curled up and quite unconscious, glowing threads of magic drifting upwards from his body and floating across the air towards a space marked out on the marble floor.
A space that was empty: Fujiwara no Sai was gone.
readerofasaph
Excerpt from the Memoirs of Life and Death
by Touya Akira
Sami Mansei (early 8th century) -
Our life in this world--
to what shall I compare it?
It is like a boat
rowing out at break of day,
leaving not a trace behind.
I was a boy when I first heard the name of Fujiwara no Sai. Looking back, it was that day which marked the end of my childhood.
My father's students brought the news to the school, which back then was a plain hall of limestone not far from the city gates, about a ten-minute walk away from the agora. It was my habit when my lessons were done for the day to spend afternoons tutoring there. The school's students were generally not aspiring mages, - those, if they had no master of their own, usually trained at the Guild - nor were they nobles with the wealth to command an Adept's teaching services for such paltry objectives as rudimentary incantation or a first-level atari. They were rather, men of the middle classes with some education and the desire for more. Some were tradesmen, some landowners, and others artisans; there were even a few wealthy slaves. Their igo was on the whole unremarkable. I did not go there in order to challenge my strength; I went there to learn the art of shidougo, which in its own way refined my spellcasting. It was part of Father's grooming me for the responsibilities of being an igo master.
But I was challenged that day. More than challenged - I was shaken to the core of my being.
“I met a child and a young man in the agora,” said a student to Ishikawa, on his way out. “They were searching for a place to practice igo, so I directed them here.”
“Oh?” Ishikawa smiled. “They had no idea where to find a school of magic? How quaint! Are they newcomers to the city?”
“Well, it's hard to say.” The student looked puzzled. He was an old man, and a former member of the tribunal. Few people knew the city better than he did. “The child is ordinary enough, his manner of speech seemed local. It was his companion who was unusual: loose white robes, and hair worn long and braided. I haven't seen men dress so effeminately since I was a child myself.” He shook his head. “In any event, I thought they would have made it here by now. Perhaps they changed their minds.”
“I've seen no children here today, besides Master Akira,” said Ishikawa, turning to smile at me. She had been part of the Touya household since before I was born, and promoted to the running of the school five years ago. “Wouldn't it be nice, Master Akira, to see someone your own age here? Of course, there is no child out there who could match your abilities.”
I looked up from the table at which I was studying a tome of tsumego incantations. “I'm content here,” I said. “Everyone has been very kind to me.”
Ishikawa tsk-ed at me, a sound of exasperation and fondness. I smiled and went back to my book. Familiar moments, the naïve complacency of childhood.
They came about an hour later, when I had just finished instructing a new student in the principles of uchikomi attack spells. A boy about my age, wearing a dark tunic, the forelocks of his hair dyed bright to contrast with natural black. He propped his elbows on the counter as he greeted Ishikawa. “Hello! Can we have an igo duel here?”
She seemed taken aback by his abruptness, but bowed graciously. “Of course you may. Do you intend to battle each other?”
The boy exchanged glances with the young man at his side. Ishikawa studied them curiously, as did several other students who were close by. They presented a strange picture to us: a young boy of the city, neither a mage-in-training nor a noble's son, expressing an interest in the esoteric arts, and a figure in flowing white linen, long-haired, delicate-faced - the appearance of Fujiwara no Sai is well-known, these days. Back then it was unfamiliar, and striking.
He clasped his paper fan to his chest and bowed low to Ishikawa - causing the onlookers to murmur - and introduced his name and Shindou's. “If it is permitted, my lady, I should like to act as Hikaru's Mind.”
It was more common then than it is now, this use of a Mind to stand beside the the duellist and direct him as he battled. Usually an instructor took on the role when an inexperienced student was learning how to duel, and following this convention we assumed that Sai was Shindou's teacher. It was a correct, if not precise, assessment.
“Ah, a learner!” Ishikawa seemed charmed by Fujiwara; indeed, people generally were. “I'll see about finding an appropriate opponent for you.”
She glanced at the slate upon which she recorded the day's attendance, running her thumb down the list of names. But Shindou had already turned to look at me.
“Oh good, you're my age!” He walked towards me. “I was thinking I'd have to battle some old man.”
We exchanged bows, with Ishikawa's disapproving frown upon us. It was not that she did not trust me to duel appropriately with beginners - she had seen me do so, many times - so I presumed that the disapprobation was directed at Shindou, for his lack of protocol, and perhaps at me for allowing it. But seeing another child at the school was a novelty for me.
“The duelling room is at the back of the hall,” I said, leading the way for the both of them. “Standard wards are already set. We cast lots to determine who uses the Black Compendium and who uses the White.”
Shindou had halted midstep. “The Black Compendium?”
“The set of spells, Hikaru,” said Fujiwara. “Remember that in a duel one is only allowed to use half of the possible spells - either the Black spells, or the White.”
It was my turn to be apprehensive. While it was clear that the boy was a learner, what manner of igo practitioner did not know about the Black and White Compendia?
“You may take the black,” I said, as we entered the room. The black side was generally stronger in those days - this was before we revised the Compendia to redistribute the offensive and defensive type spells more evenly.
My confidence in Shindou did not increase as I watched Fujiwara coach him on every small basic from positioning and posture, to the art of chalk diagramming. Even with a Mind to direct him, was he truly ready for a duel? Fujiwara seemed like an experienced master, although a little archaic in manner of dress and convention - then again, many masters were - but nevertheless, I doubted the wisdom of his sending a pupil in to fight so early.
“Would you like a handicap?” I asked. Shindou made a face.
“Whatever for? We're the same age, aren't we?”
I blinked. “...I suppose so.”
He looked to Fujiwara continually for cues, as we took our opening positions and again, exchanged bows. I nodded at him. “You’re black, so you should move first.”
“The first Star spell,” murmured Fujiwara. “Fourth diagram and Fourth utterance.” He indicated the shape in midair with his fan. Shindou knelt down and painstakingly chalked it out on the floor, and then repeated the syllables that Fujiwara spoke to him.
It was an adequate shape, if unsightly, and the first spell of hoshi was a solid opening. The lines of power flared silver, and then black as they headed towards my body. I spread my fingers in the pattern of a white shield, and began reciting the words of a counterspell. The fan was already turning, drawing new sigils for Shindou to copy.
A duel of igo appears far more sedate than the alternate forms of magic. Shougi, for instance, is a fight to first blood; strong attack and solid defense are of the utmost importance. Igo duels are about artistry as much as they are about battle; it has been held throughout history that no system of spellcasting comes closer to the beauty of the gods.
Rather than seeking to overwhelm with power, then, we sought instead to thwart the other’s patterns, determining whose design would eventually be dominant. I had a significant speed advantage; Shindou was slow, and Fujiwara often had to repeat his instructions. And yet, his joseki formed inexorably - the concatenation of spell after spell, shakily executed by Shindou but surprisingly steady as they built up, criss-crossed the room in dark magical shapes that intertwined with my own structures, blocking them, complementing them.
It was thirty minutes into the duel before I realised that I was losing.
No, not losing, but only because Fujiwara was not attempting to win.
I looked across the room, mind suddenly in turmoil. Fujiwara was deep in concentration, again reminding Shindou of the correct incantation for a connecting spell.
The spell struck, and my komoku formation swayed, but did not unravel. Indeed, Fujiwara was not trying to defeat me. It was shidougo. He was teaching me.
If this were not a duelling room, with all the magical safeguards attached. If Fujiwara were seriously challenging me…
…then I would be dead.
~~~~~
From the time I turned four, Father taught me to face my death.
It was the first birthday present I remember him giving me (my infancy and earlier years are not so clear) - the door to the igo room opening, and inside, the smooth stone floor with the edges of the duelling area marked out in colored tiles. My father bent down, his dark robe brushing against the floor, and with one hand pressed against my back, guided me gently into the correct position. He then stood, walked to the opposite corner, and bowed to me.
I bowed back, as clumsy as you may imagine a four-year-old to be. Then he told me to cast a spell, and I did. So it was that I lost my first duel that afternoon, the first loss of thousands. When I had conceded my father showed me the wards set about the room, their sigils glowing in black and white fire.
They were designed, he explained, to prevent duels from becoming lethal. Never forget that magic can kill. Never forget, that as a true practitioner of igo, you must be prepared to die.
I do not think I understood him then, young as I was. But I had many subsequent years in which to learn the lesson.
Four days after I lost to Fujiwara, my father held his study group at our home. I had attended those weekly sessions for a year and a half by that point; they were small gatherings, confined to those igo practitioners whom Father had personally mentored. Most prominent among them was Ogata Seiji, who had been studying with my father for nearly half a century.
He arrived early that evening, while my Father was still out performing a kifu to reinforce the city’s aqueducts, and was shown into the sitting room by one of the slave-girls. When I brought a tray of fruit to him, he was smoking a cigar, studying a leatherbound book lying open in his lap.
I greeted him, and his eyes flickered upwards in casual recognition. “Akira. I heard that you had an interesting week.”
Frowning, I placed the tray on the end table next to where he was sitting, before taking a seat myself.
“I met Shindou Hikaru today,” he said.
A cold frisson went through my body. “Was Fujiwara with him?” I asked.
“A small man with a lovely face, and hair like black silk. Yes, I saw him.” Ogata lifted the cigar to his lips and breathed in. “Do you not want to know where, or how?”
I was too familiar with Master Ogata to not know when he was baiting me, but learning of Fujiwara’s whereabouts was the most important thing. “Where did you meet them?”
“At the Children’s Igo Tournament. They attempted to participate but were disqualified. Your father met them too.” He was looking at me to how I would react. He had often done this since the first time I duelled Ashiwara to a draw, although it had taken me several months to notice.
“Did you watch them-“ Did you watch Fujiwara duel, I wanted to ask. But the words hesitated on my tongue, and before I could find my voice a slave had come in to announce the arrival of my father and the other study group members.
Ashiwara, upon entering the room, walked over to the couch I was on and ruffled my hair. “Hullo, Akira, it’s been a while! Have you finally decided to take the Journeyman exams?”
I had been on the verge of deciding in favour of the Guild’s exams, at last week’s meeting. But now… “No, I won’t be taking them this year.”
“Huh? That’s strange. I thought we’d decided that you were more than ready to take them.” Ashiwara peered at me bemusedly, but I was more aware of the sharp interest in Ogata’s gaze.
“I can’t take them. Because I discovered that I’m not ready to die yet.”
Ashiwara sighed, and sat down next to me. “Sometimes, I just don’t understand you! I suppose there’s no hurry for you to take the exam, as it is.”
Ogata adjusted his glasses. “Should I be charmed by your youthfulness, Akira? Or should I fear you?”
My father said, “Akira will choose his own path in igo. When he is ready to walk the road of the masters, we will be there to welcome him, and guide him.”
That brought an end to the topic, and very soon we were deep in discussion of a new variant of the keima spell that we’d seen Master Gama exhibit in a kifu two weeks ago. But my mind remained distracted, thinking about Fujiwara no Sai.
~~~~~
Study group ran late, and I did not get the opportunity to ask my father about Fujiwara that evening. Early the next day he departed for a tournament that was being held in a neighbouring city, and did not come back until a week later. I was left to struggle with my own emotions, which seemed to have intensified in the wake of Ogata's announcement.
By this point I had replayed the duel endlessly in my mind, tracing the path from joseki to yose repeatedly as if etching the battle into my memory would reveal something to me that I did not already know. I considered, too, the moves I had made at each step: if I had done this - if I had cast that - would it have made any difference? My logic said that it would not, that Fujiwara was at some level above me, one I would not be able to reach for many years. But some part of me insisted that it would. In the infinite possibilities of igo everything is made possible. I have always believed this, and this is why I have never, in a duel, let my guard down against even the rankest amateur.
Being acquainted with Shindou Hikaru is a powerful deterrent to carelessness.
But at the time it was Fujiwara who was foremost on my mind. I wondered what it would be like to fight a true duel against him, to see that practised hand making sigils not with a powerless fan, but with chalk and light and magic. How much more powerful would he be then? Would I be courageous enough, to go up against that kind of skill?
I was afraid to face Fujiwara in battle. But because of that, I knew that I had to.
That weekend, I visited the temple district in the hope that I could find out something more about Fujiwara. I had a hunch that I would find something there, based on the archaic style of Fujiwara's igo - something that became more obvious the longer I considered the duel I had fought with Shindou. Fujiwara's incantations were old-fashioned, his style of poetry reminiscent of a bygone era. Some of the diagrams he had shown Shindou were no longer in use. Possibly, then, he was far older than he looked. The city's temples, the oldest repository of magical knowledge in the civilized world, seemed a likely place to search.
Perhaps it was serendipity, that I heard Shindou's voice as I was passing in front of the Honinbou Temple. But I do not think it was.
“You lived inside this place for forty years? That sounds awful.”
“It's not as bad as it seems. There are large courtyards, you know, beyond the main temple. Torajirou and I used to take walks there on sunny days.”
“Hmm. You probably sat there and talked about igo all the time.”
“Well....” I had already begun running towards them, and could see Fujiwara flushing pink at Shindou's words, as I drew closer.
“Master Fujiwara!” He turned, wide-eyed, as I came to a stop in front of him; my heartbeat seemed to race through my head as he focused his gaze on me. “I've been looking for you.”
Shindou spoke first. “Hey, you're Touya Akira! What are you doing here?”
He was leaning against a tree trunk, arms folded across his chest, but there was genuine curiosity in his eyes. Something about his presence both agitated me and yet, gave me enough composure to take a deep breath, and speak to Fujiwara:
“I would like a match against you.”
I did not understand why Fujiwara appeared uncomfortable, and looked across at Shindou, who unfolded his arms and shrugged: “Why not? It's not like we had anything planned today, anyway.” He straightened himself and walked to Fujiwara's side. “Where do you want to battle?” he asked me. “Back at the school?”
I frowned. “I.... just to make myself clear. I wanted to duel against you, Master Fujiwara. A true duel.”
An expression I could not quite read - although I sensed that it was unhappy - came over Shindou's face, and then was gone. Fujiwara's gaze shifted over to him, and lingered anxiously for a moment, before returning to me.
“Please, call me Sai. There's no need to be formal. As to your request, Touya - I'm afraid that the only way I can meet you in battle is as Hikaru's Mind.”
“I don't understand.” I looked from one to the other. By now, confusion had gained ascendancy over the crushing anticipation that had dominated my chest minutes earlier. “Are you refusing my request?”
Shindou looked away pointedly, and said nothing. Fujiwara flicked his fan open, but kept it in his hand, hanging down by his side.
“I am sorry, Touya. I am afraid I have no magical power of my own. The only way I can meet your challenge is through Shindou.”
There was a long silence as I took in his statement, tried to understand it. “That's impossible,” I said finally. There wasn't a single human in the world who did not have magical power. How could Fujiwara have this much igo knowledge and yet not be able to perform it for himself?
He brought his fan up and held it outwards in an invitational gesture. “Examine us, please. Use your senses, and see the kifu that binds me and Hikaru together.”
There seemed no alternative but to take his suggestion, and so I murmured the incantation that would enable me to see lines of power.
“Not that one,” said Fujiwara. “A deeper one, Touya. One that enables you to see hidden kifu.” He spoke another incantation out loud and told me to repeat it after him. It was full of ancient words, some of which I did not know; I had to listen carefully before saying the sentences myself. Once finished, I looked at him and Shindou, and my breath caught.
Delicate, ornate shapes clung to the entirety of Fujiwara's body - fine magical lines, barely visible even with the help of the spell I had just cast. Each form melded into the next one seamlessly in a complex geometrical formation that covered his skin and even extended into the air around him, threads of black and white light spreading outwards like a constellation. And the longest and most intricate strands of magic were tied to Shindou Hikaru. I could see them, the weavings that bound their bodies together: Shindou's hands to Fujiwara's hands, Shindou's mouth to Fujiwara's mouth. There was even a bright, loosely-shaped length of magic connecting their hearts.
“So now you see,” said Fujiwara gently, after I had been staring for some time.
“How did this happen?” I asked, when I finally managed to speak.
“Not by my choice,” muttered Shindou.
Fujiwara looked at the two of us, and smiled. “Let's go somewhere else, where we can sit down,” he suggested. “Then I will tell you the whole story.”
~~~~~
It may seem strange, nowadays, that there ever was a time when Fujiwara no Sai's joseki were not studied, or his story not known; but indeed, such was the situation for most of history. Shindou's star has risen these last decades, my father's too, and the weight of their igo has carried Fujiwara's name with it. But back then all this was far in the future. And the Honinbou Temple had not yet opened its secrets. That morning, sitting in the formal gardens of the Assembly,in a grove surrounded by concealing vines, I was the first person outside the Shindou household to learn Fujiwara's story.
Because it is a story that will be familiar to most readers, I shall only touch on those points here that have heretofore not been general knowledge. In his first life, his true life, one might say, Fujiwara served as court magician in a distant empire. He was betrayed into a shameful loss in a duel with a fellow courtier, when his opponent tampered with the wards of the arena, and so lost his position within the palace. As part of his punishment for losing, the emperor ordered that his powers be stripped from him. He was subjected to a kifu so arcane and dangerous that the knowledge of it has been struck from the history books, and after being thus handicapped, was banished from the country.
Half-crazed with grief, Fujiwara wandered from land to land in search of a magician who might break the spell that sealed his powers. But many years passed, and no such person was found, and the enchantment itself seemed as strong as it had been the day it was placed on him. At last, driven to despair, he walked to the banks of a great river, and prayed to the gods that in the afterlife he might once again walk the path of igo. Then he fell into the river, intending to drown himself.
“As I lost consciousness, a bright light surrounded me. It is hard to describe. The water and the light closed around me, and I felt as if I was suffocating. After that...I dreamed.” Fujiwara stared down at his fan, which he had laid outspread on the stone table where we were sitting. “Sometimes I dreamt about my childhood, sometimes about drowning. But mostly I dreamt about igo, of casting spells and laying out kifu. There was no sense of the passage of time. I only knew that I dreamt, and then...the dreams passed, and again, there was white and black light. I was aware of my body floating in the middle of a lake. And standing before me was Kuwahara Torajirou.”
“Kuwahara Torajirou - you mean the Honinbou?” I asked. Throughout history, the Honinbou priests have produced some of the city's most renowned igo practitioners, but Shusaku, as most will know, is the most revered of them all. Hearing Fujiwara's story, I felt like I was listening to a myth, a legend of igo that my Father had omitted to teach me.
He nodded. “I was bonded to him for fifty years, the same way I am to Hikaru now. Our magics were linked together, and when he cast igo, I too, spellcast with him. I'm afraid that we were not being completely honest with you. I do not act merely as Hikaru's Mind, you see. My own power runs through Hikaru's spells too. It is less than what I could do with Torajirou, back then, but more than Hikaru could do with his own magic.”
“And when Honinbou Shusaku passed away...?”
“When he realised he was dying, he brought me back to the lake, so that I could return to my sleep.”
“He was sleeping at the bottom of the lake when I found him.”
“You stepped on me when you found me, Hikaru,” said Fujiwara reproachfully.
“I've already apologised for that!”
Mentally I calculated the passage of time. It had been nearly two centuries since Honinbou Shusaku's death, and if I was correct, more than a thousand since the the empire that Fujiwara described had fallen. Yet Fujiwara himself appeared to be no more than twenty or twenty-five years old.
Shindou and Fujiwara appeared to have digressed into an argument, the details of which eluded me at first. It seemed to revolve around history lessons with Shindou's tutor, but quickly changed to the subject of igo:
“We practise magic everyday! Two days ago we duelled that insei, what's his name - Waya.” Shindou folded his arms again, and turned his back to Fujiwara.
“But then we got banned from the school because you made fun of that bald man!”
“It was better than using magic like you wanted to do! With you it's always igo, more igo. I'm so tired of it. Although-” He cast Fujiwara a sidelong glance. “I wouldn't mind doing more duels if--”
“What?” demanded Fujiwara. It was striking to see the contrast in his behaviour towards me and Shindou. While his manner was always gentle, his hands always expressive, when Fujiwara spoke to me he spoke as an igo master, with grace and authority. With Shindou it had more of an air of two childhood friends playing together.
“Well, don't people always place bets on the matches, at magic tournaments? I could use the money.”
It took a moment for what Shindou was saying to sink into my head, and then I clenched one fist.
“Hikaru! How could you think of something like that!”
“Oh come on, why do you have to take this so seriously? I have to get something out of this as well, you know.” He blinked, startled, as I stood and looked at him in the eye. I felt a fury I scarcely understood at his indifference, at how little he seemed to care for Fujiwara or the art of igo.
“Fight against me again,” I said. “Both of you.”
~~~~~
The second time I lost to Shindou Hikaru and Fujiwara no Sai, I walked home and entered the igo room. There, I painstakingly recreated the duel I had just fought, spell by spell. Then I erased the magic and then recreated the first duel I had had against them.
As had happened last time, I could think of nothing else for days. Memories of both duels - images, spells, diagrams - cycled through my mind. Shindou's spellcasting was better than before. His incantations were fluent, and he no longer had to look to Fujiwara constantly for cues. But that had not been the striking difference between the first match and the second. The difference had been Fujiwara.
The second time, Fujiwara had shown no mercy. And in his relentless exquisite black patterns, I had seen my death.
When my father came back, bringing a new tournament title with him, it was already time for the next study group meeting. And I was not the only who had news to bring of Fujiwara. Shimano, a young noble, was probably the strongest igo spellcaster among those of the city who did not practice it as a profession, and generally held to have the abilities of a lower-level Adept.
He had been challenged by Shindou and Fujiwara two days earlier, at a local arena, and had accepted the challenge, and lost.
“They were amazingly strong. Perhaps even as strong as you are, Master Touya.”
My father did not answer, merely chalked a sigil onto the slate in front of him. It began to glow white.
Ogata said, “They insisted on duelling as a pair, just as they did with Akira? And the boy Shindou was unnaturally strong? There is something very strange occurring here.”
“Actually--” They looked at me, and I told them my story. When I was done, Ogata looked pensive.
“That's - a remarkable story, if it can be believed. There are books that say such things were possible. But I've never seen an example of it.”
“Could it be reversed?” asked Ashiwara. “It seems quite hard on the boy.” I looked at him, and he shifted uncomfortably. “Well, you know - I don't think children should be made to pursue igo if they do not enjoy it. From what Akira said, it seems as if he does not enjoy it. And a soul-bond is not an easy thing to live with.”
“A kifu that has lasted a thousand years? Do we have any hope of lifting it?” Ogata glanced at my father, who had already overlaid the sigil with the Nineteenth Diagram.
“Without seeing for myself, I cannot know,” Father replied.
He refused to speak any more on the subject at that gathering. But when the others were gone, he called me to his study, and asked me to tell him in great detail everything about my two encounters with Shindou and Fujiwara.
A fortnight passed before we spoke on the topic again. I returned home from the igo school on a rainy evening to find my father in the library, seated at his desk with vast stacks of books piled around him. I went closer, and saw what they were: books on kifu, on curses and blessings, on bindings and how to remove them.
My father was writing a letter. He looked up upon hearing the sound of my footsteps, and inclined his head in greeting. “I duelled Shindou Hikaru and Fujiwara no Sai today,” he said.
Even now, I could not think of the two of them without my emotions being disquieted. “What happened?” I asked, both wanting and dreading the answer.
“The boy Shindou ran out of the arena before the first joseki was complete. We were unable to complete the battle.”
“But you saw their igo. What did you think?”
He glanced at me, and then continued writing with his pen-brush. “It was flawless. The spellcasting and strategy of an igo master. With so few spells to observe, I was unable to read beyond that.”
I wondered then, what that opening joseki had looked like; I would not have described Shindou Hikaru's spellcasting as flawless by any measure of the word. I opened my mouth to question further, but then saw my father's face, and remained silent.
He had dipped his pen-brush into his inkpot, but had not removed it, and his hand remained in that half-finished gesture as he stared into space, appearing to be deep in thought.
“It would not have been a fair duel,” he said.
~~~~~
It was no surprise to any of us when Master Ogata sought out Fujiwara and issued him a challenge. By the time this happened it was summer, and there was not an igo practitioner in the city who had not heard of the pair and their story. There were even people coming from neighbouring cities and lands to challenge them. And they had never lost so far. They had defeated renowned amateurs like Kadowaki and even humiliated master practitioners like Gokiso. There were even rumors that the great masters of the city, like Ichiryuu and my father, had avoided facing them for fear of being defeated.
“I thought of challenging them, you know,” said Ashiwara. He had come to visit me at the school, and we were having a an informal match using restricted Compendia.
I drew the 3rd Diagram in order to cast a komoku. “Why don't you?”
“Ah, that's because. Because.” Ashiwara scratched the back of his head. “Well, they're so busy these days! There's always someone or the other trying to challenge them. Insei, foreigners, young nobles. Mind you, it's fascinating just watching. Fujiwara's patterns, of course, but even Shindou's spellcasting technique is really good by now. Almost the level of an insei's, I'd say.”
I knew. I had been watching their matches as well, whenever my time and duties allowed, although I had not spoken to them since the day they told me their story. Once Fujiwara had spotted me in an amphitheatre, sitting amongst the audience for their match against a foreign igo master, and waved. But Shindou had turned away, refusing to look at me, and for that reason among others I had found myself reluctant to approach them since.
“Besides, it'd be better to challenge Fujiwara once they cast the unbinding, wouldn't it? Isn't that what you're waiting for? How is your father going with the development of the unbinding spell?”
“I'm not sure. Father has never talked to me about it. But I heard the Kisei talking to Master Morishita about it, and he said that it was only a matter of sorting out minor details now.” I did not, at that point, know how or when my father had approached Fujiwara and Shindou with the idea of the unbinding, only that it had been done at some point. I did not want to broach the subject with my father until he chose to himself.
“But Master Ogata has gone ahead and challenged them anyway. Ha ha, I bet he was just impatient.”
“Perhaps.”
Ogata came to visit our home that evening. It was a fine day, so Father and I sat with him in the courtyard, watching the sun go down behind the outline of the city. The slaves brought sweetmeats and a decanter of wine. Ogata poured himself a glass and drank it in one gulp.
“I heard that you lost,” Father said.
Ogata reached for the decanter again, then changed his mind and lit a cigar instead. “It was worth it. His igo is strong - better than strong. His igo is magnificent.” He glanced at me. “Not just Fujiwara, you know. Shindou Hikaru too. Four months ago the child barely knew what igo was. But he's keeping up with Fujiwara's patterns, and easily most of the time.”
My lips tightened, and I looked ahead, avoiding Ogata's scrutiny. “He doesn't care about the art. Somebody like that can't possibly have true strength.”
Ogata shrugged, but did not seem inclined to disagree with me. There was a dreamy look in his eyes.
My father looked first at him, and then at me. “Either way,” he said, “we will have no way of ascertaining the boy's talent, or Fujiwara's true abilities, until the unbinding.”
“I wonder if it is necessary. Why tamper with the gift of the gods?”
“It is what they both want.”
“And what you want too, doubtless.” This time Ogata did take the decanter. His second glass of wine was swallowed even more quickly than the first one. “Is is the pursuit of igo sacred or profane, I wonder?”
~~~~~
He came to me one week before the unbinding was scheduled to be performed, walking past Ishikawa with the usual lack of ceremony.
“Can we talk?” he asked, standing by the table where I was demonstrating sigils on a slate. Fujiwara hovered some yards behind, looking anxious.
I bowed my head in apology to the student I was teaching, and glanced up at Shindou. “Certainly, after school is done for that day. About an hour.”
“That's fine.” He turned. “Maybe we should get something to eat then, Sai--” But they had been recognised, and were soon surrounded and deluged with requests for matches. In the end it was I who had to wait for them to finish their second duel.
“What did you wish to speak with me about?” I asked, when he and Fujiwara came out of the duelling room.
“I don't know. I just wanted to talk to you, that's all.” When I stared at him, he reddened. “Is that so strange?”
It seemed out of keeping for Shindou to be feeling awkward, and I regarded him for some time before finally saying: “Well, would you prefer to talk here? Or at my home?”
Fujiwara was using his fan to cover his mouth. “Perhaps somewhere else would be better,” he suggested. “Hikaru, that place would be good, wouldn't it?”
For once Fujiwara took the lead, taking us through the streets to a quieter area of the city where I rarely went, lower down in the valley, lined with long rows of flat-roofed stone houses. They led me down a cobbled lane ending in a low wall, which we clambered up and walked along in order to get to the rooftop of an adjacent house.
“We come here a lot,” said Shindou, sitting down cross-legged on the rooftop. “It's a good place - nobody recognises us in this part of the city.”
I had not stopped to consider the effects that notoriety must have had on his life. “It must have been difficult for you.”
Shindou shrugged. “It'll be less annoying once we have the unbinding.” Again that discontented expression, the one I could not decipher, passed over his face. But then he looked at Fujiwara - who was busy peering at the surrounding houses and valley with bright eyes - and his features smoothened into composure again.
It was curiously comfortable, sitting there with the two of them - with hindsight, I would say that it was the one chance I had to participate in their closeness, in the bond between Shindou Hikaru and Fujiwara no Sai that was magical but also more than that. We stayed there quietly, the three of us, watching the daylight grow dim. The air grew cooler, and the sound of birds and insects more prominent as the noise of wheels and footsteps became less so. There were stars coming into the sky and a low-lying gibbous moon.
It was not until the sun disappeared completely and we had stood up, preparing to to return home, that Shindou finally asked me his question. “When the unbinding is done, will you have a duel with me? Just me, I mean.”
Fujiwara was behind me; I felt, rather than saw, him smiling.
“Of course,” I said. “I would be happy to do so.”
None of us knew how long it would be before I could keep my agreement.
~~~~~
And now we come to the part of the story that is difficult to tell.
The unbinding was held on the day before the autumnal equinox. It was decided that it should be performed at the Pavilion of Profound Darkness, located next to the Guild headquarters; Shindou's family were all present, as well as the principal workers of the unbinding: my father, Ogata Seiji, and Ichiryuu Kisei. Kuwabara Honinbou was there, as the other preeminent priest of the city.
News of the unbinding had not been widely circulated, but there were spectators nevertheless, and they filled up the courtyard; Kuwabara Honinbou was obliged to chalk a barrier in order to keep them away. The appropriate diagrams and sigils were drawn across the pavilion, the wards were set, and those not directly participating in the working such as my Shindou's parents and myself were instructed to stay outside of the wards. It was an open pavilion and circular, originally designed for duelling, and afforded a good view of the magical activity being undertaken within it.
As they started, my father once more turned to Shindou and Fujiwara. “I would like to make sure before we begin that you are at peace of mind about what we are doing. Do you have any doubts about unbinding this enchantment?
Shindou looked at Fujiwara's face, and then back at Father.
“No,” he said, voice determined. “We'll do it.”
They began by unveiling the enchantment on the two. The Kisei uttered an incantation, Master Ogata formed a sigil, and the lines of power flared. And I saw it again for the last time, the kifu that bound the two together. It is the greatest spell I have seen in my lifetime, and probably the greatest I will ever see.
Another diagram followed. An incantation. Another barrier went up, this time obscuring our vision. There was power radiating from the pavillion, visible even to the unaided eye.
It took perhaps an hour. The crowd began to disperse, bored by the lack of apparent activity; the ones trained in magic lingered, aware that the enchantments being effected here were something one could live a mage's lifetime and not see. We watched magical power wax and wane and drift outwards, unable to guess what manner of spell within was generating those outbursts of energy.
Master Ogata tells me that to the last moment as they worked there was no wavering, no false step, no sign up till the last possible moment that the unbinding would be anything other than successful. for me, I only know that I waited, and watched, until I saw the barrier flicker, a sign that it was being prepared to be taken down and that the working was coming to an end. It did not flicker long, perhaps a minute, before disappearing. We all saw it, then.
Shindou Hikaru lay at the centre of the Pavilion, curled up and quite unconscious, glowing threads of magic drifting upwards from his body and floating across the air towards a space marked out on the marble floor.
A space that was empty: Fujiwara no Sai was gone.