Chapter 6 #2
But Takeo’s voice was in my head, Takeo’s hands guiding mine, Takeo’s kata burning into my muscles through hours of practice. It was the last thing I had of home, the last connection to my family. But I had to learn. I had to change. I had to grow beyond the lessons of my youth.
I tried again.
Fell into the old pattern again.
The reed struck—crack—across my forearm this time.
The tall, thin boy was glaring openly now. Each time the reed struck, each time the sharp crack echoed across the courtyard, he flinched, as if sharing my pain, as if my failures were disrupting his concentration, as if I was making things harder for all of them.
The stocky boy with the scar was doing better. His movements were rough and unrefined, but he followed the form accurately. The reed still struck him—crack, crack—but less frequently than I realized.
The nervous small boy was struggling, too, his fear making him hesitant, but at least his movements were correct. When the reed struck him across the backs of his legs, he whimpered but did not stop moving.
The delicate-featured boy moved like he had been born to it. Every motion was precise, controlled, and fluid. He made it look effortless. The master barely touched him with the reed, and when he did, it was the gentlest tap, more reminder than correction.
And the tall, thin boy—he was good. Very good. His military bearing served him well here, as he performed the form with mechanical precision, each movement crisp and sure.
I tried again.
And again.
But each time, my body betrayed me, falling into Takeo’s patterns.
Crack. Crack. Crack.
My shoulders. My back. The backs of my thighs. My forearms when my blocks were wrong. Each strike left a burning line of pain that flared quickly and faded slowly, building on the previous strikes until my entire body felt like it was on fire.
“Stop,” the master commanded.
I froze, breathing hard, my body trembling with exhaustion and pain.
“Show me,” he said.
“Master?”
“Show me what you were taught. This other form you cannot forget.”
My face burned with shame. The other boys were watching now, all pretense of practicing their own forms abandoned. Even the delicate boy had turned to look at me.
I had no choice.
I took the stance Uncle Takeo had taught me and began his kata, our family’s kata.
Left foot forward, ball of foot pivot, rising block, counterstrike.
The movements came easily, naturally, my body remembering even as my mind screamed at me to stop.
I completed the form and stood there, exposed, waiting, resisting the urge to guard against the blow that would surely come.
The master walked around me slowly, his expression thoughtful. “A peasant kata.” His voice was not cruel, merely matter-of-fact. “Effective in its own way, perhaps, for simple combat, but it is crude and unrefined, without proper mechanics or energy flow.”
Each word was like a blade. Takeo had been trying to help me. He’d given me what he could—what he’d been taught—and it was being dismissed as worthless.
“You will forget this,” the master said. “Every movement, every principle. You will empty yourself of this knowledge so that you may be filled with something true, something pure.” He paused. “Do you understand?”
I nodded, not trusting my voice.
“Then begin again. Forget what you were. Learn what you must become.”
I took the stance and began the form again.
I tried to push Takeo’s voice out of my head and ignore the muscle memory screaming at me to move differently. And when I failed, the reed found me again.
We continued until the sun was high overhead.
My legs shook, and sweat soaked my training clothes, salt stinging where the reed had broken skin.
Slowly—so slowly—my body began to forget what Takeo had taught and began to accept this new pattern.
The movements grew fractionally less wrong with each repetition.
Still, the other boys’ hostility became more open as the morning wore on.
The tall boy “accidentally” stepped too close during one transition, forcing me to stumble back. The stocky boy’s foot shot out as I moved past him, causing me to trip—not obviously enough for the master to see, only enough to make me fall.
Crack.
When I rose, the stocky boy was already back in position, face blank, as if nothing had happened.
The nervous boy seemed torn between sympathy and self-preservation. He glanced at me occasionally, his expression almost apologetic, though he never helped, never warned me when one of the others was about to trip me or bump me during a difficult transition.
Only the delicate boy seemed truly indifferent. He practiced his forms with the same serene perfection, never acknowledging my existence at all.
Finally, the master clapped his hands once. “Stop. Midday meal.”
I nearly collapsed with relief.
I hadn’t thought it possible, but the afternoon was worse. The master took us to a different part of the grounds where obstacles had been laid out in a long, winding course. There were walls to climb, ropes to swing from, logs to balance on, ditches to leap, even a mud pit to crawl through.
“Begin,” the master said.
The tall boy went first, attacking the course with zeal. He was fast but not graceful, using brute strength where technique might have better served. He finished, breathing hard, and stood aside. His training clothes were soaked with sweat, and mud streaked his legs.
The delicate boy went next. He flowed like a dancer, finding elegant solutions to each obstacle, making it look easy, though I could see the strain on his face by the end.
The stocky boy struggled with the rope swing, his weight working against him, but his strength carried him through the climbing sections with ease.
I held my breath as the nervous boy hesitated at every obstacle, fear making him cautious, but he completed the course without falling. The reed’s retort was swift and merciless.
Then it was my turn.
I was already exhausted from the morning. My body ached in places I never knew existed. My hands were raw, and my legs trembled.
But I ran.
The first wall was higher than I was tall. I jumped, caught the top, pulled myself up. My shoulders screamed in protest where the reed had struck, but I swung my leg over and dropped down the other side, landing hard, a spear of pain shooting through my already abused knees.
The rope came next. I grabbed it, kicked off, and immediately knew I had misjudged the distance, falling short to land in the mud below with a wet splat.
Behind me, I heard it. Not quite a laugh. Just a sharp exhalation from one of the boys. The tall one, probably. I crawled out of the mud and continued.
My feet slipped on the log twice, and I had to windmill my arms to stay upright.
I barely made the leap over the ditch, my foot catching on the far edge.
The mud crawl threatened to suck me deep below the earth, making the second wall feel like climbing a very slippery mountain.
By the time I reached the end, I could barely stand. My legs were jelly, my vision swam, and mud covered me from head to foot, caking in my hair, under my nails, in my mouth.
I gulped in air, hoping for a ladle of water, but the master’s voice barked, “Again.”
And so we ran the course again.
And again.
And again.
The sun crept across the sky, shadows lengthened, and the afternoon heat gave way to blessed evening coolness.
I lost count of how many times we ran the course.
My body moved on autopilot, muscles responding even as my mind grew foggy.
I fell more times than I could remember, more times than I could ever remember.
Into the mud. Off the balance log. Missing the rope swing again and again.
The other boys fell, too.
Even the delicate one stumbled on his fifth or sixth run, landing hard in the mud pit. For a moment, his serene mask cracked, and I saw frustration flood his eyes before he smoothed it away.
The tall boy’s glares turned to expressions of grim determination.
The stocky boy’s enthusiasm faded to dogged persistence.
The nervous boy simpered silently, tears streaming down his face as he ran, but he did not stop.
No one dared stop. By the end, none could stand.
The sun had slipped below the horizon, trailed by hues of orange and milky blue.
We lay in the dirt at the end of the course, gasping, unable to move, each covered in mud and sweat and blood from scrapes and cuts we had not noticed acquiring.
The master hovered over us, his expression unchanged from the moment he’d first arrived that morning.
He looked down at our broken bodies and nodded once, as if satisfied.
“Up,” he said.
I thought I had misheard. Surely he did not mean—
“Up,” he repeated. “You will clean yourselves before evening meditation.”
Somehow, we rose. Or rather, we crawled in unison, then stumbled, then finally stood on shaking legs.
The master led us to a courtyard with a stone basin filled with water so cold it made my teeth chatter when I splashed it on my face.
We were given rough cloth and instructed to scrub away the mud and blood.
The cloth abraded my welts, making them burn anew.
The cold water felt like knives against my raw skin.
But we cleaned ourselves.
Because we had to.
Because the master demanded it.
Because the day was not over despite Amaterasu’s slumber.
When we were as clean as we could manage with cold water and rough cloths, still shivering, still barely able to stand, the master led us back to the meditation courtyard.
“Sit,” he said. “Close your eyes. Return to your breath.”
I wanted to weep, wanted to curl into a ball and sleep and never wake up, but I closed my eyes and tried to breathe, tried to find stillness in a body that was screaming with pain.
Crack.
The reed found the nervous boy, whose breathing had become ragged with suppressed sobs.
“Breathe,” the master said quietly. “There is only breath.”
We sat there as the stars came out. As the temperature dropped. As our wet skin prickled with cold.
Crack. The reed correcting posture.
Crack. Correcting breathing.
Crack. Crack. Crack.
As the moon rose high above the temple, the master finally said, “Open your eyes. You are dismissed.”
We stumbled to our feet. The young monk who had fetched us that morning appeared to lead us back to our cells. I could barely walk. Each step was agony. My body was one massive, throbbing ache, layered with scrapes and bruises.
We moved through the corridors like ghosts, silent and broken. I understood why none of the others had spoken that morning. Speaking required effort, effort none of us could afford to spend on anything beyond the master’s commands.
As we passed through a dimly lit hallway, the stocky boy stumbled ahead of me. I was close enough that I could have caught him, but my body was too slow, too tired to react in time.
He caught himself against a wall, breathing hard.
The young monk escorting us didn’t notice. He’d already turned a corner, or perhaps he simply didn’t care. In that moment, neither did I.
The stocky boy glanced back at me, and for just a second, something passed between us. It wasn’t quite kindness or alliance, rather a simple recognition.
We were both suffering the same hell.
Then he straightened and continued walking.
At my cell, I collapsed onto the sleeping mat. I wanted to examine my welts, to assess the damage, but I was too tired, too broken to care. I lay there in the darkness, staring at nothing, feeling everything, and thought of Kaneko.
Always Kaneko.
I hoped he was not suffering, hoped that wherever he was, whatever was happening to him, it was better than this endless cycle of pain and exhaustion and demand for perfection that could never be achieved.
This was only the first day, the first step on the path of a lifelong journey.
That thought chilled me to my core.
Tomorrow would come too soon. The bells would ring in the pre-dawn darkness. The master would appear with his reed. And we would do it all again.
And the day after that.
And the day after that.
Until I forgot everything I had been.
Until I became what they demanded.
Until perfection was beaten into my body one strike at a time.
Or until I shattered completely.