The celebratory mood among the villagers quickly disappeared in the cold light of morning. Fear and worry returned with a vengeance when they realized that the black moon was little more than a day away. Noticing the growing panic, Jack immediately put the village to work and the furious last-minute preparations helped to distract the farmers from the coming attack.

Most were involved in the final push to finish the dry moat. When they showed signs of flagging, Saburo shrewdly split the workforce between the two ends and challenged his unit to race Yuudai’s to the completion point. A samurai’s sense of pride soon took over. Saburo and Yuudai’s competitiveness was heard throughout the village in their increasingly vocal shouts of encouragement.

While this digging race went on, Jack took the opportunity to inspect the state of the other defences with Yori. Thanks to Miyuki’s ninja healing, he no longer walked with a limp and she promised a full recovery in time for the battle.

Heading first to the barricade, Jack was stunned to discover it guarded by a line of samurai.

‘Where did all these ronin come from?’

Yori simply grinned at this reaction.

‘How did you persuade –’

It took Jack a second look to realize their new recruits were straw dummies wearing the spare samurai helmets and armour. Crossing the wooden gangway and drawing closer, it was now obvious. But from a distance, the impression had been entirely convincing.

‘This was your idea?’ said Jack, rapping his knuckles upon the helmet of the nearest straw soldier.

Yori nodded. ‘They’re no good at fighting, of course. But hopefully Akuma will be fooled into thinking we’ve got a whole battalion of samurai! We can also use them to draw musket fire.’

‘Yori, you’re a genius!’

‘I merely remembered one of Sensei Kano’s lessons,’ Yori replied humbly. ‘The eye sees only what the mind believes it sees.’

‘Well, my mind fooled me,’ said Jack. ‘And the bandits will definitely be deceived.’

The two of them made their way over to the forest. As before, the defences appeared to be non-existent – apart from Miyuki’s basic wooden barrier and Saburo’s thorn-filled ditch that now cut across the main path.

Yori glanced nervously at Jack. ‘Akuma could march straight in here.’

‘To see with eyes alone is not to see at all,’ said Jack with a wry smile, as he recited another of Sensei Kano’s teachings. ‘When you’re dealing with a ninja, it’s what you don’t see that you should be afraid of!’

As they crossed the southern paddy fields to the bridge, Jack’s heart dropped like a stone. In all directions, the water had become encrusted with ice.

‘We’ve flooded these too early!’ he exclaimed.

‘It can’t be very thick yet,’ said Yori, picking up a rock from the pathway and tossing it high into the air.

The rock bounced and skittered across the hardened surface.