Love is Always Write Anthology Volume 7

rather see it coming.
    The older samurai stared at him for a long moment. With a barely noticeable flick of his head, he motioned toward Jonathon. The samurai holding two horses stepped forward and stopped one of the horses before Jonathon.
    Jonathon took it as a sign he was to mount. It looked as though his head would remain on his neck…for now. He bowed to the samurai who'd brought him the horse and expressed his thanks. No reply came.
    Quickly securing his satchel to the saddle, Jonathon mounted and turned the little bay mare to follow as the samurai took to their horses and started toward the forest. It appeared they meant to travel for at least part of the night. He wondered if the entire journey would be like this, the samurai ignoring him. He hoped not, but he also didn't want to push conversation on them for fear of offending them.
    A sigh passed through him. If this was how Lord Takezaki was also, getting close enough to him to carry out his deed was going to prove incredibly difficult. At least he'd already decided doing it wouldn't be as hard as he thought. Not after hearing from Barrett how the lord was willing to forego his beliefs for victory. It seemed his romantic notions that the samurai lived for honor were just that, nothing more than fantasy.
    ****
    A heavy sigh escaped Jonathon. An entire night and day of being ignored. They'd ridden only a couple hours during the night before setting camp, then were up with the sun and back in the saddle, not a word spoken to him the entire time. The most interaction he got from any was assistance with his horse and being handed food and drink.
    Of the food, it was simple for travel, onigiri - rice balls - and dried fish. Early that morning when they'd neared a small village, he smelled fresh food cooking, and he salivated like a hound, but the samurai seemed unaffected. Even more, they seemed to want to avoid contact with others and would nudge their horses into a purposeful trot to get by any populated area more quickly.
    He didn't understand why, but then, as he was discovering, he didn't understand much of anything. For all his lessons with Mr. Jenkins, he felt like he knew nothing of the men or their culture. Of course, other than doing his best to express gratitude for food and assistance, he hadn't tried to interact much with the samurai either. He watched them. He studied them. But his fear of laying an accidental insult kept him silent.
    Jonathon glanced to the side. The forest they traveled through was dense. Not far beyond the road – if the ragged path they traveled could be could such a thing – all was covered in shadow. Around them and above them, where the trees were thinned, the late afternoon sunlight streamed down, turning the leaves to a luminescent emerald. He saw flashes of bright colored wings and heard the unfamiliar songs of birds, but they were no less beautiful than the melodies of those he'd always known. He breathed the humid air in deep, closing his eyes in a long blink as he savored warm scent of moist earth and foliage.
    One thing he already had to admit, Japan was beautiful. It was mountainous, with thick, verdant forests and well-tended farmland. From what others had said, excluding Mr. Jenkins, the people here were crude, uneducated. He knew he hadn't interacted with anyone other than his escorts, but the people he saw walking on the road, working in the fields, and in the villages didn't uphold those allegations. They seemed like…people. Just people. Going about their business, trying to live their lives.
    It didn't seem so different from many of the rural areas in the United States he'd seen when he traveled from Boston to New York and finally across the entire nation to San Francisco, and just like in the States, he had a feeling life in the cities here would be different. It made him all the more anxious to reach Kyoto, and it surprised him that was even possible with how much he was anticipating meeting Lord Takezaki Kazuhiro.
    Jonathon sighed as he looked forward. He'd thought this was going to be easy. Or, as easy as killing any man ever was. With the sympathy he was already feeling toward the country and her people, he feared meeting Lord Takezaki and what that would do to his resolve. He could only hope the man would prove insufferable and make him want to season Takezaki's food with the arsenic. He would find out soon. For how long they'd been traveling, he wouldn't be surprised if were close to Kyoto.
    He