Chapter 7: Proposition

Higa emerged from the woods at the edge of the campsite, a freshly killed doe hanging limply across her broad shoulder. She set the carcass down beside the tanning rack, then planted her massive cudgel in the ground, leaning on it as she wiped the sweat from her brow.

“That’s three today,” she announced, looking over to where Satou was preparing a stew beside the fire pit. “I swear, they’re so loud and careless when they’re horny.”

“Just like you,” Satou replied. She marched over to him and lifted him off the ground with one arm, feigning anger as she playfully bit at his neck, his feet scrabbling in the air.

“Set me down, I have to stir the stew!” he protested between bouts of laughter. She placed him back beside the crackling fire, and he resumed stirring the broth that was cooking inside the large, iron cauldron with his ladle. After a few stirs, he brought the ladle to his lips, blowing on the liquid to cool it and then taking a quick taste.

“Let me try,” Huga said, crouching as he lifted the ladle to her lips. She took a sip, smacking loudly as she played the broth over her tongue, then nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah, this is good! You’ve become quite the cook over the last few days, little Satou.”

“Well, you taught me where to find the herbs and how to prepare the meat,” he added as he resumed his stirring.

“You’ve improved on the recipe, this is better than mine. I’d better not teach you to hunt, or I’ll be out of a profession.”

After their night of passion he had decided to stay with Higa for a while longer, they had been living together in the camp for five days now. She had been teaching him how to cook and how to forage for food, how to track animals and how to build his own tent. She was imbuing him with all of the knowledge that he required to make his own way in the world, as she had promised. It had been like a dream for Satou. He got to spend all of his time with her, there were no nagging family members or tedious duties to come between them, and they had made love every night. Once or twice during the day, too. Higa seemed to enjoy his company as much he enjoyed hers. The life of a trapper was a lonely one, and he was becoming proficient at more than just cooking...

She walked back over to her latest prize, skinning and butchering it as Satou finished preparing their meal, hanging its pelt on the rack with the rest. When she sat down by his side on the grass, he passed her a large bowl, and she began to eat hungrily. She must have worked up quite an appetite during her latest hunt.

“So have you thought about what you’re going to do about your family yet?” Higa asked, pausing as she fished out a hunk of venison with her fingers. Satou had tried to push the thoughts of his family and his shoen from his mind while they had been bunking together, not wanting to let it ruin his good mood. His short-lived escape from reality had been pleasant, but he couldn’t keep putting it off forever. Eventually, he would have to decide what he was going to do.

“I’ve been trying not to think about it,” he admitted, staring into his own bowl of stew and watching the pieces of root vegetable float about on the frothy surface.

“You can stay with me,” Higa offered, “if that’s what you really want. I have to leave once the hunting season is over and I’ll be heading back up the mountain. I could take you with me. Truth be told, I think I’d miss you. I’ve come to enjoy having you around, you’re good company. Problem is, the air up there is thin, and the environment is cold. I don’t know how well you’d fare, and past a certain point turning back becomes difficult. I can’t just take you home if you decide that you don’t like it.”

“I did say that I wanted to scale those peaks one day,” he muttered, turning his gaze up towards the towering mountain in the distance. The snowy cap shone white in the glare of the sun, wispy clouds cloaking its bare rock face above the tree line.

“I think you should return to your farm,” Higa added. “At least once, just to see what’s been happening there since you left. Maybe your parents have cooled down by now and reconsidered, they could be worried sick about you.”

“What if I stay here and you leave?” Satou asked. “When would I be able to see you again? Would I have to wait an entire year until next spring?”

She seemed conflicted for a moment, her brow furrowing as she considered her reply. Satou got the impression that she liked him a lot more than she let on, especially since their first escapade in her tent. The Oni seemed to want to remain detached, more of a teacher than a lover, like she was humoring him for her own entertainment and not because of any deeper romantic connection.

But Satou wasn’t stupid. He had seen it in her eyes when they made love, felt it in the way that she clung to him during their most passionate moments, as if afraid that he would escape her grasp. He had awoken to her gazing longingly at him on more than one occasion, and when they slept together, she liked to stroke his hair, holding him close to her and burying her face in the nape of his neck. He had even heard her murmur his name in her sleep once, as if she had been dreaming about him.

“I ... don’t know,” she replied solemnly. “During winter and autumn, travel on the mountain is very difficult and dangerous, sometimes impossible if there’s a lot of snowfall. For six months out of the year, it’s usually unsafe to travel to and from the Oni village.”

“And what if you were to stay down here?” he suggested.

“The summers are a little too hot for my kind, but more importantly my village relies on me to bring them meat and pelts to last them through the winter.”

“Are there no other hunters besides you?”

“There are,” she admitted, “but I have an important role to play. I can’t just abandon my kin.”

Perhaps Satou should not be abandoning his kin either. What of Nagao and the other villagers? What would become of them if he should shirk his duties to follow Higa up the mountain? His brother could take his place in time, even marry the Lady Sasaki in his stead. But even if he felt justified in rejecting the sham marriage that had been forced upon him by his parents, he could not bring himself to forsake his shoen and all of the people who lived there. He had left the village angry and exhilarated, but now his head was clear.

“There must be some way to make this work,” he grumbled, “some way to make everybody happy...”

“I think that if you try to give everybody exactly what they want, you’ll end up being disappointed,” Higa said as she finished off her bowl of stew.

“Exactly what they want...” Satou mused, deep in thought as Higa looked on curiously. “You’re right,” he finally said after a minute of deliberation. “I at least need to try to patch things up with my parents. It’s a long shot, but perhaps they’ve come around. I’ll head back down the mountain tonight and see what happens. If my fears are realized and they’re still furious, I’ll be back again before morning, and my decision will have been made a whole lot easier.”

She reached down and ruffled his hair sympathetically.

“Don’t worry too much kid, things are rarely as bad as they seem.”

With the moon lighting his way, Satou descended the mountain. He now knew these forests well enough that he didn’t have to rely on the stream to guide him. He had thought it better to arrive after nightfall as there would be no villagers tending the fields, and so he could visit his parents relatively unmolested.

It had only been a few days, but as he emerged from the trees by the edge of the terraced rice paddies, it felt like had been gone for years. The crop was growing quickly, the green chutes reaching higher than the last time that he had seen them, that was good. It was the first time that he had been away for so long, it was so odd not knowing what had been happening within the tightly knit community since his departure.

The village was quiet, the small huts spread out at random between the fields as they made use of what space was available, dirt paths worn away through years of use linking them together. At the top of it all, perched on the highest terrace, was his family’s house. It was grandiose compared to the rest, even though the building materials were not too scarce and it was only lavishly furnished in comparison to their neighbors. Even the quality of a person’s home was tied to their social status, all of these people could have built similar dwellings for their own families, but some misplaced sense of duty and obedience kept them from doing so. What had once seemed so natural and orderly to him now seemed perverse and unnecessary.

He arrived at the door and rapped his knuckles on the wood, waiting a moment as he heard the sound of shuffling feet from the other side. When it opened, he was cast in a golden glow from the flickering candles within, his mother standing before him in one of her flowery kimonos. She wrapped her arms around him before he even had a chance to greet her.

“Oh Satou, you’ve come back! I was so worried that you might have gotten lost or hurt!”

He had been prepared for a shouting match, but her uncharacteristic show of affection softened his heart, and he returned her hug. After a few moments, she stepped back, looking him up and down. On top of his clothing, he was wearing a downsized version of Higa’s fur cloak, camouflage for when he accompanied her on hunts. Satou had also foregone his straw sandals, choosing instead to bind his feet with furs and strips of tanned hide, more practical for hiking through the rough terrain of the forest. Higa went without shoes, and she seemed to have done so for her whole life, but Satou lacked the tough soles and callouses that she had developed. He must have looked strange to his mother, she had only ever seen him dressed in more formal attire.

“I’m so glad,” she continued, “have you finally come to your senses?”

“I was going to ask you and father the same thing,” he replied. At that, he saw a shadow cross the room. His father appeared behind his mother, who then bowed her head in deference and stepped out of his way. Satou stared the man down for a moment, his gaze unflinching.

“Have you reconsidered your marriage to the Matsuyo girl?” his father asked, not even taking the time to greet him. He was a stubborn man, as immovable as an ox, and he seemed just as angry with Satou as the day that he had left. Satou wanted to reply in kind, but he wasn’t here to butt heads. He had been given a lot of time to think during his descent down the mountain, and something that Higa had said had stuck with him. He might not be able to give everyone exactly what they wanted, but what if he could give them something equivalent, perhaps even something better that they didn’t even know was a possibility? He had formulated a plan, drawing from much of the knowledge concerning the operation of the shoen that had been drilled into him over the years by his father, and now he had to set it in motion.

“No, father,” he replied.

“Then you have no business in my house,” the man said, turning his back.

“Wait,” Satou continued, “I have a proposition. A solution that I think will work for everyone.”

His father paused, and for a moment Satou wondered if he was going to reject the very notion, but then his mother spoke up.

“At least hear him out,” she pleaded, and after a moment his father’s shoulders seemed to physically sag as he gave in.

“Very well, but be quick about it.”

Satou stepped over the threshold and joined his parents around their table, his father refusing to make eye contact even as they sat across from one another. His mother seemed nervous but optimistic, clearly happy just to have her son back in their home again.

“You have arranged for me to marry the Lady Sasaki,” Satou began, laying the groundwork before pitching his recently concocted idea. “You intention is to unite our two families and in doing so, combine our two shoen. We would have a larger workforce, more land, and we would produce more rice.”

His father waited, stony-faced as he sat there in silence.

“This cannot happen,” Satou continued, his father’s brow furrowing. “The marriage was arranged without my consent or my knowledge, and my heart belongs to someone else. However, I have a responsibility towards my family and my shoen, one that I do not intend to shirk. I have a different proposition, a way to expand the shoen and bring prosperity to its inhabitants without me marrying the Matsuyo girl.”

“And what is that?” his father scoffed.

“When grandfather founded this community, it was to escape unjust taxation and the mistreatment of farm workers. He wanted us to be free, self-sufficient, is that correct?”

His father nodded.

“And yet even today, do we not pay a significant portion of our rice crop in taxes and bribes? To the point that we have scarcely any for ourselves and must subsist on inferior grains like millet?”

“Now you suddenly concern yourself with finances and bureaucracy?” his father complained.

“Is it not true?” Satou pressed, “how much of our crop do we give away in exchange for being left alone by the greedy magistrates down in the lowlands?” He directed the second question towards his mother, who handled most of the finances herself. She looked to her husband for a moment, as if waiting for his permission, then decided to reply.

“Eighty-five percent of the yield goes to taxes paid to the regional Daimyo and bribes for local officials. Much of what remains is used in trade or sold to merchants.”

“What if we could keep all of the rice that we produced?” Satou added, “one hundred percent of it? What if we only had to part with the take that we chose to sell or trade, and none of it went towards lining the pockets of corrupt officials?”

That seemed to pique his father’s interest, but the man remained surly and skeptical.

“How would you propose that we achieve such a thing?” he asked.

“I will ask the Oni to carry a message to her people on our behalf, and request an alliance between our two villages. No debt collector would dare come to the valley if they knew that we were allied with Oni. We could also trade with them, they’re fine hunters, we could exchange rice and other grains for meat and furs. The entire village could feast on venison and rice every day, we would have ample stores of food for the winter such that we would no longer need to ration during the coldest months.”

“Then this Oni that you speak of is real?” his father asked, “it was not an ill-conceived excuse to avoid marrying?”

“She is as real as you or I,” Satou replied adamantly. “You see the fur cloak that I’m wearing? She made it.”

His father considered, stroking his chin as he went over the details of Satou’s plan.

“You would have me reject the rule of the Daimyo, reject the traditions and the laws of my forefathers? You know well that it is not the place of a mere farmer to defy his betters.”

“Grandfather removed himself and his people from a society that treated them with cruelty and contempt,” Satou argued, “and yet the culture that originated that cruelty still persists. You have brought it with you, kept it alive. Tell me, what does it matter if the Daimyo gets his due from our poor farming community or not? If the magistrate is denied a fraction of his ill-gotten wealth, then what of it? Why cling to these traditions when all they do is harm us? If we are to become truly self-sufficient as grandfather intended, then we should make our own rules, our own customs. The only reward for our obedience is poverty, we get nothing in return for our taxes.”

“And what of the Matsuyos? Would you have me go back on my word and disgrace our family too? I promised them a marriage and an alliance.”

“Marry the Lady Sasaki to my brother. There is legal precedent, the practice of gyauenkon. But only if he consents. The two are very alike, both bookworms who prefer to spend their days indoors. I’m certain that they will get along well, but the choice must be his alone to make. Arranged marriage is an ugly custom that we should have left behind on the lowlands.”

“But your brother is too young to support a family,” his father protested.

“He’s only a few years younger than me, and this was always going to be a political marriage. The girl will live here with you regardless. A wife is married as much to her new family as she is to her husband, so what does it matter? The goal is to unite the two shoen, heirs will follow in time.”

“Then you would give up your title and your inheritance so that your brother can take stewardship of the shoen in your stead?” his father asked. “If so, how will you forge an alliance with the Oni that you speak of? Without a title, you cannot bring their family into the fold through marriage.”

His father was still thinking in such rigid terms, as if he could only see the world through the narrow lens of lineages and inheritance.

“It would be an alliance of friendship, not of blood,” Satou explained. “They have things that we need, meat and furs. We have things that they need, grains that they can’t grow up on their peak and goods from the lowlands that they can’t access any other way. Just imagine it, two shoen and an entire village of Oni, all trading and cooperating together. We would have access to the yields of both farms with no taxation, enough rice and meat for everyone, furs enough to make a coat for every villager during the winter. The whole mountain would become like a nation unto itself.”

“And you are sure that these Oni would protect us in the event that the Daimyo sent tax collectors after us?” his father asked.

“Why would they not? The benefits are obvious for all parties. Even if the Daimyo marched an entire army of Samurai up the valley and demanded tribute, a single Oni could knock them down like a game of daruma otoshi. I’ve seen one of them kill a bear in a single strike with an iron cudgel that was longer than a man is tall. The threat alone should be enough to dissuade them.”

His mother and father exchanged glances, clearly surprised and intrigued by what Satou was suggesting. He had presented a solution that they didn’t even know was an option, and it would benefit everyone who had been wronged by his refusal to marry. Even his father’s expression had softened, could he be winning the old man over?

“This is ... a lot to take in all at once,” his father finally said. “It seems too good to be true, and it will be a challenge to convince the Matsuyos. It all sounds like an elaborate excuse to get out of our obligations. I must admit that I am not yet convinced myself.”

“What would it take to convince you?” Satou asked.

“I would like to see this Oni with my own eyes, for one.”

“We should hold a meeting,” his mother interjected, her excitement at the prospect making her unusually outspoken. As the bookkeeper of the shoen, perhaps she had more insight into the potential financial gains than either of the men did. “We should invite both the Matsuyos and the Oni to the village and hold a meeting between all three parties. Then they would be able to see for themselves that Satou’s Oni is real, and we could discuss the arrangement in greater detail.”

“Very well,” his father said, “I accept your proposition Satou. We will send word to the Matsuyos and have them send a delegation. It will be your responsibility to bring the Oni here. Do not let me down again.”

Satou knew that all was not forgiven, but at least now he had a chance to make amends in his family’s eyes and to fulfill his obligations to the shoen. If everything went according to plan, the villagers would become far more prosperous than if he had simply gone through with the marriage.

His parents stood, and Satou followed suit, rising from his kneeling position at the low table.

“It will take at least a full day for a courier to reach the Matsuyo shoen and then return with their answer,” his father said. “Return tomorrow night.”

The implication was obvious enough, Satou’s father did not want him staying in the house overnight. His wife glanced at him, but she didn’t try to make Satou’s case. It was of little concern, he preferred living with Higa in the woods anyway.

His parents escorted him to the door, and then he gave them a respectful, low bow before vanishing into the night.

“But I can’t make this decision for my village, I’m just a hunter!” Higa protested. Satou leaned forward and stoked the fire with a long stick, a plume of grey smoke rising into the starry sky.