Sapphire Ambassadors

She's actually here?

News of her cousin's presence in this city had caught Inori by surprise - just a small missive from her father to her, arriving this morning. Of all things. Inori hadn't seen Yuiko in almost a year now, mind you. There would be some catching up to do. On top of all the other excitement...

I can really use a familiar face though, and possibly some advice.

So she'd arranged for an early midday meal and sent a note to Yuiko...and now the best part, familiar even to those who only trained to be soldiers....waiting.

Having just dropped off her belongings in her room, Yuiko wasted no time availing herself of the extended invitation.

No polite, demure scratching at the door and a quietly voiced announcement of oneself here. Not among kinsmen, not among family.

"Oi! Ino!" It wasn't the most familiar form of Inori's name that Yuiko could have used but, then again, she was still in the hallway. "Tis I, Yuiko!"

A pause.

"I got your invitation!" She wasn't shouting, per se, but she was a trained bard - her voice carried due to having been trained to project above the din of combat. "Can I come in?"

Sweet Kannon, I had forgotten how loud she could be Inori thought, and I'm not sure about the name either But that was that, nothing to get worked up about, and she replied:

"Sure, come in. So good of you to come on such short notice!"

Well, as for preparations...those were limited. Inori had set aside the futon and gotten out two sitting cushions, plus the small desk, some tea and a rather...sparse selection of snacks. Well, 2 short skewers of Dango and a few senbei. The room was not large, after all, and still held her belongings in a chest and the easel. Hard to hide that.

And there she was, sitting at the table, fidgeting. Still, it will be nice to catch up

Sliding the door open with no small amount of force, Yuiko brushed a stray lock of hair that had fallen across her face out of the way and beamed a warm smile at Inori.

"Cousin! How long has it been?"

Not standing on nicities - save for the appropriate bow, she wasn't a barbarian after all! - Yuiko entered the room, shut the door to give the pair privacy, and settled down on one of the cushions.

"Uncle sent word that you had graduated. I gotta admit, Ino-chan," There it was. The familiar copulation of an already familiar form of the name that even Yuiko wouldn't use in the public space of the hallway. "I was expecting to have run into you again in the summer, on campaign. But this is nice too!"

"Nice to see the Thousand Stances improving in their arts program. Who was your sensei for, ah! Painting!"

"Mostly myself, and books" Inori answered. "I figured some things out, shall we say. Good to see you again, Yui-nee. It has been an...eventful year since we've last met"

Inori was unhappy with the evasive talk herself. Nerving herself up to say more.

"Things have been strange for me. For starters...I'm not sure I will even be around for the summer campaigns"

It was at this point that a savvy eye might spot that the sword stand held only one of the two blades.

"Eh? Why not?" Yuiko asked, helping herself to a rice cracker. She leaned on the table and waggled the half-eaten cracker at Inori as she chided playfully, "Can't stay in the dojo forever, you know. You have to get out there, bring further glory to your family's already glorious name."

Gesturing over to the sword stand with the cracker, Yuiko's curiosity was piqued.

"Sent your blade off to the polisher, I see. Whose sword was passed down to you, cousin?"

Inori closed her eyes for a bit. Exhaled heavily.

Oh well. It had to come out at some point...

"There has been no sword. I now wield....a paint brush."

She smiled ruefully.

"Which is to say that while I diligently trained to be a Spearwomen just like before, it was not..." she was fumbling for words "Things took another turn. I have not received an answer's blade, not even a new arsenal sword. I have another gift, of sorts, very unexpected. Maybe it was another thing an ancestor bequeathed, who knows, but..."

Yuiko paused. An uneaten bit of rice cracker tumbled down to the table between the two women.

"Oh."

The normally loquacious bard was left with little other than to furrow her brow in thought at this new revelation.

"This is certainly unexpected. Uncle never mentioned it." Yuiko set the rive cracker down so as to allow herself to compose her thoughts.

After a long moment with lips pursed and brow furrowed, Yuiko nodded to herself.

"You're still my cousin, Ino-chan. A proud daughter of a long, noble family line. And you're here with me!" Her voice rose in tenor as she warmed to this idea. "So you say you paint? Let's see it, then. You have some previous works available?"

"It's nowhere near that tragic" Inori said, smiling despite her anxiety.

This could have gone a lot worse,

"It is hard, and strange, to just have things change so much. Sometimes I still feel like I should double down, train with the spear even more, but...you know, I think there is something to these strange things I can see, and the painting. Painting them calms me, and I think I can...change things, a little."

Shook her head a little "It's not real proper Shugendo. But a little like it"

Yuiko shook her head. "I don't know much about what shugenja get up to, cousin. We've some relatives you could talk to who could help you, I'm sure."

"I mean, go back in our genealogy far enough and I'm certain there's someone there with the same talents. They could assess you and if that's the case, well, you'd be a proper priestess, I'd think. No more spear-using for you, then, I'd think."

The Ikoma looked over at the Matsu to gauge her reaction to that.

Inori shook her head "I've checked the genealogies, at least what I could look into, and at least 5 generations back there's...nothing. I think everyone else was as surprised as I was. I couldn't make sense of it until I just started....painting what I saw."

She pointed toward a rolled leather scroll case she carried with her.

"You can take a look if you want. I know it is something like what Shugenja do, that much has been confirmed to me by an Isawa at the 1000 stances Dojo. Whether the talent is strong enough or of real use - who knows. A Kitsu Sensei also told me that once I developed my own technique I would need extensive retraining to learn theirs."

She frowned.

"It's all a bit much, really. I really would have liked things to have stayed the way they were..."