The audience was crowded in stands alongside the artificial lake and leaning out of windows in the covered corridors that topped the walls which enclosed the Edo Castle martial arts practice grounds. Spectators laughed as they egged on the armies, enjoying the tournament.

But Sano and everyone else who competed in them knew that these tournaments were almost as dangerous as real battles. Somebody always got hurt. Sometimes players were killed. Audiences enjoyed that the best. It was the most exciting part of the game.

The lake grew crowded with men who'd fallen in. They frantically swam, trying to avoid being kicked or crushed by the horses. Fighters howled in genuine pain from the blows dealt by the blunt yet heavy wooden weapons. Sano took a whack on his shoulder and knew he'd have a big bruise tomorrow. As he parried his opponent's strikes, he thought that perhaps, at his age of forty-three years, he was too old for tournaments. But it was his duty to participate for as long as he could.

"Stop!" cried a shrill, reedy voice.

The battle suddenly halted. Men reined in their horses and froze as if turned to stone. Sano sat with his sword crossed against his opponent's. In the lake, men treaded water. Blades hovered, suspended in the act of striking.

"Hold that pose!" the shogun called from inside a pavilion that stood on a rise near one end of the lake.

Thunder grumbled, and a drizzly rain began to fall from the misty gray summer sky, but nobody dared move.

Tokugawa Tsunayoshi, the supreme dictator of Japan, knelt at a table spread with paper, ink-stones, and jars that held brushes and water. He wore a smock over his silk robes, and the cylindrical black cap of his rank. He squinted at the battle scene, then sketched rapidly with his brush. An admirer of all forms of art, he dabbled in painting, and equestrian scenes were among his favorite subjects. Sano had seen his work and thought it not bad, certainly better than his leadership over Japan.