However, as he drew nearer to the stronghold, Jimmu was reassured to see that he had been mistaken. Hamamatsu was not on fire, but ablaze with light. The walls were lined with flaming torches and braziers, and bonfires had been lit on either side of the approach to the main gates, which stood wide open. The fortress had been transformed into a beacon to guide the scattered Tokugawa troops to safety, and as if this were not enough, from within the walls came the beating of great drums.

Jimmu rode in through the gateway, expecting Hamamatsu’s main courtyard to be a solid mass of soldiers, but to his astonishment it was almost deserted. A few armed men scurried about, apparently at random. Archers and musketeers were spaced widely apart along the battlements. A handful of officers bawled out orders.

Mystified, Jimmu found a hitching post, dismounted, and tethered his horse.

Almost at once he was accosted by a captain whose armor bore the Tokugawa badge. The captain thrust a bow and a quiver of arrows on Jimmu.

“Here, take these and join the defenses on the north wall!” barked the captain.

“But where is our army?” asked Jimmu.

The captain smiled ironically.

“This is our army,” he replied. “The rest are still on their way back. There are two hundred of us at most, and the Takeda have ten thousand cavalrymen alone. Go quickly now! There isn’t much time.”

Jimmu made his way up to the battlements on the north wall, where he was amazed to be reunited with Kambei.

“Kambei?” he gasped. “How did you get here?”

“As quickly as I could,” retorted Kambei. “Our detail came under cavalry attack. I got separated from the others and headed back to Hamamatsu.”

“Did you see Captain Muraki?” Jimmu said.

Kambei shrugged.

“I was too busy running to see anything,” he confessed.

Jimmu frowned at the torches, the braziers, and the thin spread of men.

“What’s going on, Kambei?” he said. “Why haven’t the gates been closed? Why have so many torches been lit? This is more like a festival than the preparation for a siege.”

Kambei chuckled wheezily.

“This is all Lord Ankan’s idea!” he announced. “It’s a bluff. The lights and drums will draw our men back, but they’ll draw the Takeda too. When they see the open gates, they’ll suspect a trap. What lord would be stupid enough to leave his main gates wide open to the enemy, unless thousands of men were hiding inside?” Kambei chuckled again. “Choju Ankan is a wily one!”

Nichiren’s voice grated inside Jimmu’s head. “It is a coward’s plan! A brave lord would fight to the death rather than bear the shame of defeat.”