Gray samurai ambush Blackthorne’s escort and take him; Yabu retrieves him

The Gray samurai ambush of John Blackthorne’s escort turns a guarded transfer into a struggle over who controls him. Disguised attackers kill the escort leader, scatter the rest, and march Blackthorne back toward the city; Yabu’s sudden charge drives them into the woods and retrieves Blackthorne, but the rescue ends with Yabu and a Gray captain facing off over where he will go next.

From the Courtyard to the Woods

Blackthorne’s transfer begins among prisoners being led out of a courtyard by jailers and samurai. An official reads from a scroll before each prisoner moves toward the great doors with his guards. Unlike the naked men around him, Blackthorne is given a loincloth, a cotton kimono, and thonged clogs; his guards are samurai. He plans to run once he reaches the gate, but they close ranks around him and prevent his escape.

Outside, a crowd watches beneath bright sunshades. A man has already been roped to a cross, and the cross is raised while eta wait nearby with long lances. Blackthorne considers grabbing a sword and choosing a quick death, but the samurai turn away from the arena and lead him toward the city and the castle instead. The change in direction offers no assurance of safety: it brings him into the custody of an armed escort whose protection will soon be tested.

After climbing between streets into a residential district beside a substantial wood, Blackthorne takes pleasure in the soft grass and the path through the trees, even as he recognizes that he is still weak and needs rest, a bath, and food. The quiet route becomes the setting for the attack. A party of about thirty Gray samurai comes around a bend; after the captains exchange formal greetings, questions are asked and answered, and the newcomers turn their attention to Blackthorne.

The Ambush and Disguise

The attack begins with an abrupt betrayal of the encounter’s ceremony. The Gray leader draws his sword and impales the leader of Blackthorne’s escort. At the same moment, his men fall on the other samurai. The assault is so sudden that the attackers are killed almost at once, ten of them dying before they can draw their swords. The Gray leader, however, remains in control of the scene.

Blackthorne’s surviving escort kneels with their foreheads pressed into the grass. Their heavyset captain sends sentries to both ends of the track, and men collect the dead attackers’ swords. They pay no attention to Blackthorne until he begins backing away; a hissing command immediately stops him. At another order, the newcomers strip off their Gray uniforms. Underneath, they wear rags and old kimonos, then pull masks over their faces. One man carries the discarded uniforms into the woods. The transformation makes their official appearance look like a disguise, and Blackthorne concludes that they are bandits, though he cannot tell what they want with him.

The bandit captain surrounds Blackthorne with his men and orders the kneeling members of the escort to leave. They first raise their heads in disbelief, then bow, back away, and run into the undergrowth. With his guards gone, Blackthorne has no chance to escape. The captain contemptuously motions him toward the city, and he complies, now a captive of the party that has just attacked his escort.

Yabu’s Intervention

Near the edge of the wood, the bandits encounter another force: roughly thirty samurai, Browns and Grays, with the Browns in front, their leader arriving in a palanquin and packhorses behind. The two groups halt about seventy paces apart and take hostile positions. The bandit leader steps into the gap, points at Blackthorne and back toward the ambush, and angrily orders the other party aside. His men draw their swords; one takes position behind Blackthorne with a blade raised, making the threat immediate.

The man in the palanquin gets down. Blackthorne recognizes Yabu, who shouts back at the bandit leader. When the leader continues to threaten him, Yabu gives an order and charges with a battle cry, limping slightly as his men surge after him and the Grays follow. Blackthorne drops to avoid a sword blow that could have cut him in half. The bandit leader turns and flees into the undergrowth, and his men go with him.

The Browns and Grays close around Blackthorne. Some pursue the attackers into the bushes, others run up the track, and the rest spread out protectively. Yabu stops at the edge of the brush to issue orders, then returns at a slower pace, his limp more pronounced. The bandits are not brought back. His intervention has restored Blackthorne to the protection of Yabu’s party, but the manner of the rescue leaves the rival forces and their claims on Blackthorne in plain view.

A Rescue Without a Settled Claim

After Yabu reaches him, Blackthorne answers in the same Japanese formula of acknowledgment that Yabu has used. He points toward the fleeing bandits, thanks Yabu, and bows politely as an equal. He also invokes a blessing for Friar Domingo and apologizes for being unable to speak Japanese. The gestures let him express gratitude and recognize Yabu’s intervention even where his command of the language fails him.

Yabu calls the Browns back and the Gray captain calls off the pursuit. When the captains meet, they argue, pointing toward the city and the castle in an obvious disagreement. Yabu finally overrules the other man with his hand on his sword and motions Blackthorne into the palanquin. The Gray captain refuses, and the two men begin to square up as the Browns and Grays shift nervously around them. The event therefore ends not with a quiet escort to safety but with an unresolved confrontation over Yabu’s authority to take Blackthorne away. The rescue changes who holds him, while leaving the political contest embodied by the armed men around him unsettled.