Chapter Two

‘Well! What have we here? Does the baseborn strumpet think that to marry into the illustrious Tsubakikoji clan grants her dignity above her station?’

Like the crack of a gentlemen’s cane upon an unruly chinaman’s backside, Saori Tsubakikoji’s insult rang out across the drawing room, lacerating my soul. With typical audacity, she revealed the vitriol and contempt she and her sisters harboured against me – feelings that until then had remained tactfully concealed behind a veil of false compassion. Of course, I had always expected the ladies Tsubakikoji to challenge my inheritance, and thereby deny me the estate that is mine by right. What I did not expect is for them to do it so soon after my husband’s untimely demise. Three weeks ... barely enough time for the hounds to devour Shunsuke’s corpse, and already conspiracies designed to undermine his memory prowled in the shadows, like a pack of spiders stalking a large and delicious lizard.

A word on Saori Tsubakikoji. Saori was the youngest of the Tsubakikoji sisters, and therefore the least restrained. Where her siblings relied on the aristocratic art of guile and calumny to achieve their ends, Saori would delight in direct confrontation, attacking her foes openly and with juvenile insolence. In the rare cases she found her aggression thwarted, she would fall into fits of hysteria so prolonged and tempestuous that only the intervention of a professional trained in the treatment of womanly complaints could guarantee a return to peace. Ordinarily, extreme emotional impropriety of this sort would be grounds enough to diagnose incurable idiocy, perhaps as a result of misshapen brain organs. In this instance, it was merely the natural manifestation of a personality weaned on entitlement in the absence of discipline. Saori Tsubakikoji was not insane – she was spoilt.

But although Saori was immature and reckless, she was also possessed of a vicious cunning, equal to that of any imp in Satan’s menagerie. Knowing my history, she had indubitably reckoned that my status as a gutter-blood coupled with my ordinarily meek composure would prohibit a response to her unprovoked attacks on my dignity, thereby diminishing my claim to nobility in the eyes of common law. In this she was fatally mistaken. Saori’s verbal shuriken were sharp and poisonous, but their sting was fleeting. My rejoinder would not be so easily endured.

I put down my brush, and resigned myself to completing my work – a baroque depiction of a nude Saori Tsubakikoji being eaten by a pack of ravenous jackals – another day. Rising from the painter’s stool, I turned to face my sneering assailant.  

‘I am not the woman I used to be,’ said I in a low, dignified tone. ‘I am Reiko! Wife of the eldest son of the Tsubakikoji family! This house is rightfully mine! Do not discount the resolve of a lowborn woman!’

Before the horrified Saori could muster a fitting response, I capitalised on her lack of composure and let fly a vicious right-handed hook-slap, connecting squarely with her exquisitely defined cheek. The blow was a crushing one. Having spent the majority of my life in the most uncivilised slums, my command of the feminine art of slap combat was of necessity excellent. Conversely, as a member of the nobility since birth, Saori had been shielded from the rigours of martial conflict her entire life; even the most ferocious aristocratic disputes were seldom resolved with physical force. But now the challenge had been issued, and issued forcefully. My foe was honour-bound to accept it – or lose her right to the Tsubakikoji estate.

A pregnant silence ensued as Saori struggled to regain her wits and balance. Although I expected little in the way of a response, I readied myself all the same, adopting a defensive stance learned from time spent in the tutelage of the infamous Slapping Harlot of Scumington, Madame Smack. I could see from the look in her watery eyes that Saori recognised my superiority in the combative arts, but even so, I knew that her pride would not allow her to yield so easily. She stood facing me, her arms by her side, her face filled with furious indignation and determination.

‘How ... how DARE you?’ she screamed, her voice resonating with all the hatred of wounded harpy. She struck at me – a careless cross between a diagonal eye-strike and a hooked cheek-buster. Easily avoiding the clumsy blow, I countered with a forceful downward smash, connecting with Saori’s right temple, causing her to stumble and fall over a nearby lounge chair. She rose awkwardly, her bosoms quivering with outrage, and – with a hideous, unholy screech – threw herself at me. Once again, I dodged deftly, and watched as Saori’s momentum carried her past me and through the large picture window situated next to my painter’s stool. With a moan, she collapsed to the sodden earth outside,  covered in broken glass ... bleeding and defeated.

‘I trust you will complain no further?’ said I, and once again took my place in front of the unfinished canvas, noting happily that it too had survived the commotion - completely unharmed.