XXIII. An Envoy
The first heavy rain of spring comes on the morning of your new tutelage.
You have come to Master Kaien's dojo, in the outskirts of Summer. It is a simple school of antiquated style, its central building only one story high. You cross the beaten courtyard where on another day the younger pupils would practice the sword - but you are no junior, and so you have come when the master would be alone.
Ayuri Kaien is waiting for you on the threshold of his dojo, sitting cross-legged and eyes closed in a meditative posture. His hair is grey and thick, sports a thin moustache of a style that would typically be considered unfashionable, and wears a red hakama. As you approach he opens his eyes and slowly comes to his feet; the deliberate nature of his motions makes you suspect aching joints. Could this really be a good enough master to teach you despite his age?
You stand under the rain until he calls out to you. A wide blue umbrella protects you from the rain, but your sandals are clogged with mud.
"So you are the new puppeteer, then," he says, his voice sharp and clear. It's not a question. You nod. "I am told you lost everything in Autumn. With whom did you train?"
"Master Keshin taught me the art of puppeteering. Mistress Anoi taught me the art of the naginata."
"Hm. Keshin I didn't know. Anoi was very skilled, but she still carried dying traditions with her. More than that, I can hear the order of your priorities. A puppeteer first, a samurai second, is that right?"
You bow. "Always."
"Not my prefered kind of student, but still one I can teach. Come," he says, and steps into the dojo; you follow him onto the tatami floor, where he stands at one end in a ready posture. You look at him quizzically.
"I want to test you wrestling first."
"Suit yourself," you say - he has not yet accepted you, and so you do not him the reverence of a pupil. You pull off the two top layers of your kimono and the wide sash hiding the practical belt underneath, then remove your muddy sandals. In one moment you have gone from a lady of the court to a fighter in the school.
You come at Kaien hard, and the man folds quickly. It is not a true fight, nor does he mean for it to be one; he accompanies your blows and lets himself fall, more interested in judging your technique than your strength. But he jumps back up quickly and orders you to come again, and you comply, again and again. Arm-throws, elbow-locks, sacrificial throws, simple ground tackles, everything goes, the old man giving in a little later each time, giving a little more resistance.
Eventually Kaien stops, panting - in fairness you are too - and points to a weapon rack to the side of the room.
"Sticks now," he says, and you go fetch two long staves of wood, tossing one to him. The next engagement is less brutal, less direct; you use your spear-fighting technique to control distance and openings, keeping him on the defensive. You win a few bouts like this before Kaien withdraws and tosses the staff aside, nodding. "Shinai," he says; you go fetch two wooden practice swords at the rack, give one to him, and exchange a number of trades. This time he gives as good as he gets, your skill with the katana not quite up to his own. Eventually he stops; by that point you're starting to feel sore all over.
"You're good," he says with a nod. "Now go and circle the ramparts of the city at a run."
You blink.
"I'm sorry?"
"I'm not a spear-fighter," Kaien says with an authoritative look, "nor a sword-fighter, nor even a wrestler. I am all these things, though. Above all what I teach is the one thing that unites them: fitness. Strength, endurance, flexibility. Your skills are excellent, that I can see. Your physical strength is lacking, because you rely on your bunraku to provide it. But without your own strength, the capacity of your armors are limited, and it will tire you faster. Your endurance is great - much better than I expected - but it could be better. And more than this, your balance of strength, skill, and endurance is off."
"And this relates to running the perimetre of the entire city after an hour of exercise, in the first heavy rain, how?" You ask, a little outraged.
"Oh, that's only the start. Every day you train with me, you will begin with that run. Eventually, we'll make it two runs. Starting today, though, when the run is done I will give you weights to lift. This way we will enhance your strength when your endurance has been brought to your limit, and teach you how to leverage your strength in periods of exhaustion."
You didn't sign up for this.
"What are you still doing here?" Kaien barks. "Go on! Get running."
You didn't sign up for this, but if you're honest with yourself, it's no worse a form of insanity as that of your old masters, it is just a different one. Mistress Anoi had this thing about balancing water buckets on both ends of your spear…
You sigh and resign yourself. You put your sandals back on - tomorrow you will come with better shoes - and turning your back to Master Kaien, you begin a steady run towards the city ramparts, in mud and under heavy sheets of rain.
***
You're not supposed to train with Master Kaien every day, of course, but he has insisted that you do so for the first week, to "forge a relationship" and "catch up on lost time." All attempts at explaining that your "lost time" had included so much battling and marching that it was training all of its own proved fruitless, and so you now sit in Lord Summer's court, body aching and head throbbing.
But you're proud, at least, and you have reason to be: you currently occupy a position among the advanced rows of the court, the two dozen trusted samurai closest to the dais on which sits your dragon-lord. A cup of water has been put besides you, replenished by a discreet servant every now and then as you take sips to freshen your throat parched by an hour of intense exercise.
The current topic of the court is the tax revenue of the sale of a specific kind of wheat flatbread to the southern lands, a subject which is as important as it is foreign to you, and so you allow your mind to wander while others discuss the matter and the lord occasionally chimes in with a polite, but unquestioned remark.
It is this disinterest, perhaps, which allows you to be the first to realize the commotion. You hear noises outside the court room doors; guards giving threats or warnings without daring to shout and courtiers frantically whispering, then slipping into the room to whisper messages at the ears of their superiors. You frown and lend an ear, surprise that anyone would dare make a fuss so close to a lord who does not like impropriety; but very quickly things take an even more dramatic turn as the sliding doors of the court room are pulled open.
A slender woman wearing a many-layered kimono of silver steps into the room, accompanied by two soldiers - not samurai, that you can tell; they look more like roguish types, bearded and scarred, their equipment haphazard, one of them even wearing an armor clearly made up of parts of two different sets. The woman however has none of that ragtag appearance; she wears a silver-painted wooden mask in the effigy of a bird, too stylized for you to recognize, and for all the elegance of her kimono she carries a daisho at her belt.
"My lord," says one of the door-keepers of the court room - an important man despite the title of his station; an actual noble, whose task is to remember all the names and faces of the city of Summer, the broad lines of the same in neighboring cities, and to monitor who has cause to enter the room and who doesn't - "I am sorry, I was at a loss. I don't think there is any protocol…" The man collapses in prostrations without finishing his sentence, and the woman, indifferent, walks among the ranks of stunned samurai until she reaches the empty space between the two rows of advisors.
"It is all right," Lord Summer says, pushing his palm down in a gesture of appeasement. "Before we decided if you have erred, let us hear what our guest has to say."
The masked woman lifts her chin, her arms elegantly folded in her sleeves, and proclaims in a voice loud, striking and clear, the voice of a trained orator:
"My lord, I am Silver Crane of the Seven Mendicant Blades. I come here as an envoy of the Pauper Prince, ruler of the Hidden Village. Mine is a mission of peace, for I have come to extend the Prince's magnanimity. The Prince is aware that he has been treated as a mere bandit lord, and his men cut down as such; for this he is willing to extend forgiveness. The Prince has no desire but peace, prosperity, and stability in our time. He has empowered me to come to you, to present you his claim, the extent of his territory, and a first draft of a proposal for trade."
Stunned silence falls upon the chamber.
After a moment, someone at the far ranks of the sitting samurai bursts out laughing, and is immediately shut down by one of his companions. Silver Crane's masks remains unreadable. Lord Summer looks down from his dais, his iris-less eyes glimmering with distant stars.
When he speaks it is in a soft, singing tone.
"Alas, Silver Crane, I do not recognize this 'Pauper Prince' as anything more than an upstart brigand, and so I cannot acknowledge his claim to lordship. It follows that as you are no servant to a lord, you are a ronin; and a ronin serving under a bandit. This makes you a criminal and an outcast by the laws of Summer. Guards," he says with a simple wave of his hand, "arrest her."
If Silver Crane is surprised by this, she does not show it. Even her two burly guards, who reach for their swords (which they are likely not legally allowed to own, let alone carry in Castle Summer's walls), are stopped by a simple gesture of her immaculate hands. To their credit, your lord's guards do not touch her; surrounding her, they invite her politely but very firmly to follow them, and she complies, as do her guards.
But as she is about to leave the room, she turns her head.
"This was your chance; do not rue the day when it comes, for you will have brought it upon yourselves."
Lord Summer's eyes narrow, the ranks of his guards tighten, and they make no second stop before leaving the room and taking her to… Wherever the lord's prisoners are kept, you suppose.
"I will adjourn this council," Lord Summer says once the sliding doors have been closed again. "There are important matters to discuss with select members of my staff."
The samurai all bow deeply and leave the room in order of protocol, walking without turning their back on the lord's presence; you prepare to do the same, but Lord Summer halts you with a gesture, and you freeze mid-standing up.
When all but the select few are gone, leaving Lord Summer, Lady Gozen, a handful of military and diplomatic staff, and you, Lord Summer frowns.
"Whatever she wanted, that wasn't it. She couldn't possibly hope to gain what she says she came here for, so she was a sacrificial pawn. Even so, I could not let this insult pass. A ronin serving a bandit, trying to assert himself as lord of his own city? I will sooner have death than this in my domain."
Several of the military advisors nod and murmur their enthusiastic approval, the diplomatic advisors are a little more subdued, and Gozen is a single, grim, but sharp nod.
Inevitably, your lord's eyes fall on you as your silence lingers.
[ ]Express approval (cautious). It was a good idea to arrest the envoy before she could do anything, but you should be wary of harming a messenger, a cultural taboo, and grant her a respectful captivity.
[ ]Express approval (zealous). It was a good idea to arrest the envoy, and you would go one step further; once all useful information has been obtained from her, such a traitorous samurai should be executed.
[ ]Express doubt. You do not think arresting Silver Crane so quickly was a good idea, and you would rather have provisionally extended her an emissary's immunity while you considered what her offer meant.
[ ]Express disapproval. A samurai is a samurai, and Silver Crane serves a lord. This alone should have allowed her all the respect and treatment of a samurai and a diplomatic envoy until you dismantled that lord's claim through force of arms.