This is how things are.

At the end of the Hot Season, the Blue Silk Glove Marchwarden mounts upon her tiger, which rides on the hidden winds all the way to the Court of Nine Calamities, where the indolent mountain-and-cloud gods keep their revels. There she announces herself, and presents the commands of the Sapphire Mother of Lotuses concerning where they are to loose their herds, and how much rain they will let flow. And there she says: you may take your orders and be paid for your work, or you may tell me you will not; then I will take you and knock you down, and the Court may see who is the stronger! Then, if the mountain-and-cloud gods do not prove irascible, she will take their brandies with them, and make free with the chest of offerings she brings with her, and pay for the services of courtesans of the upper air.

Sometimes they seize her and she knocks them down, and they are chastened; and sometimes she seizes them and they knock her down, and then they are emboldened. And when they are chastened, they grumble among themselves and make trouble among the work orders; and when they are emboldened, then they work great mischief, and then rivers flood and bridges melt away. And at times they will hold back their flocks, but they will succumb to the temptation to make a clamour before too long, and then what a storm there is!

And it is known, too, that they shake their silver manes at the Blue Silk Glove Marchwarden, and leer at her, inquiring whether she knows what happens to a flower overwatered; and it is known that the N’yari preach the Storm Victory, destined for some ever-elusive day. On that day, they say, the earth will crack and yawn, and the thunder will drive the House of Lapis Lazuli into the deeps below with a great slide of mud and water; and then we shall see who rules, flowersick lowlanders! And then we shall see who rules.

***

In the Flower Kingdoms, in the Rainy Season, there is no sunlight. Not at dawn, not at dusk, not at midday. The clouds are a blanket over the sky, and the light is theirs.

Look up, and see them roiling like the waves of the sea, shot through with streaks of moonish light. They are bright, bright enough to illuminate everything below in grey and silver, and they are inconstant, making shadows sway and flicker below. The rain is a steady, constant drumbeat, a drowning-out; raise your voice, or sit close together.

In defiance, the kingdoms below open countless umbrellas, a sudden blossom of endless flowers. In defiance, stained glass lanterns break the silver cloudlight. In defiance, the oiled traveling-cloaks are donned, long and covered in intricate designs: of labyrinths (among the more daring, who do not mind its N’yari connotations), of leaves, of rivers, and of course, of flowers.

The roads are churned mud. Barges still work their way up and down swollen rivers, but the wealthy and proud travel by litter. After all, wheels may get stuck, but a true child of the Flowers knows how to walk over mud without losing their balance or their way.

When the rain grows strong, or the traveler grows weary, then see the lanterns at the door to the inn or the teahouse, inviting you inside for a drink and an opportunity to dry yourself off and rest your feet in a heated basin; or, if money or time is tight, a seat on a bench in a covered and crowded food court, where the sound of the rain mixes with the hiss of fried noodles.

Han!

The Dragon’s Pearl is fairly standard, as far as highland barges go. It sits high in the water, traveling at a sedate pace downriver, pulled by an ox on the canal path and guided along by poles. At its prow is the carving of the Thunder Dragon, the legendary mother of the Flower Kingdoms, clutching a pearl in her talons; her horns rise from the center of her head in waves, like some vast and deadly chameleon. Behind, the barge’s deck is half covered by a curved roof over simple benches. The barge, not being particularly large, usually has extra passengers sitting between the prow and the benches, legs tucked in beneath them to fit underneath an umbrella.

But today, there is a wedding party traveling downriver to Golden Chrysanth taking up the benches, and you are not going to make somebody sit outside when they should be surrounded by their friends and family. So you are sitting, stubbornly, in the rain, radiating disdainful energy to scare pity away. Besides, who would dare approach you? You’re looking pretty scary, and the wedding party is comprised of lowlanders who recognize your fashion: a dangerous highlands country thug. Probably doesn’t want to be around us, you can almost hear them saying. Don’t give her an umbrella, she’d just end up breaking it.

So you sit, getting wetter and wetter, hood up but rain somehow getting inside your poncho anyway, in the low light of dusk, completely umbrellaless. And that’s when the priestess (who you were sure was with the wedding party) looms over you.

“Do you mind if I...?” She doesn’t finish the sentence, but goes ahead and takes a seat right next to you. Very close, even. Shoulder of her blue river-patterned poncho rubbing up against yours, the back of her hand holding the umbrella over both of you brushing against your soaked knee. When she half-turns to glance at you, her face is hidden— well, of course it’s hidden, she’s veiled and has her poncho’s hood up. But the lantern light from the covered benches glints off her glasses, and you get just a glimpse of her dark eyes behind them.

“I was getting a little overwhelmed over there,” she lies, transparently. “It’s all... bwah, yay, you know? Just a lot!” She does a little gesture with her free hand that might be intended to be... fireworks? “Thank you for letting me take a seat where it’s quieter.”

(She smells like a garden just after rain, but even sweeter, richer. Her voice is high and has an accent you can’t quite place, but sounds... classy. And she’s tilting the umbrella over you.)

What happened to your umbrella, anyway? And are you going to scare this little busybody off, before she can get on your case about something?

***

Piripiri!

Yayeh!

Festivals in Golden Chrysanth are riotous, and the Umbrella Festival is no exception; it might, in fact, be the biggest. Despite the flooding of the gutters, everyone is happy to say that not a drop of rain reaches the street, there are so many umbrellas on display on the streets (not to mention stalls, making the already cramped streets into tight mazes). The lanterns hanging at every door and stall turn the silver light of the stormy sky into a kaleidoscope.

Yayeh!

Fried fruits! Fried fish! Fried flatbread! Sticky sweet pastes! Fried noodles, coated in spicy-sweet sauce, served eyewateringly hot! Mystery Filling Buns, with the skeleton of an umbrella traced in frosting, each one a gamble! Wine, spiced or floral, poured into flimsy paper cups! Golden Rum, the official drink of the city, which you, as a visitor, must always remember to order diluted and with ice (lest you sear orange molasses into your throat), both because it’s cheaper and because only barbarians drink it straight (as you did, that first memorable time). Candied nuts, dried fruits, fruit-infused cookies, and that odd N’yari dish cooked in a sheep’s stomach (and nobody will tell you what it’s made of).

Yayeh!

And nobody’s wearing ponchos, which means bare shoulders and bare arms, bare stomachs and bare chests (though that is both rarer than it was and a deliberate political statement, these days). Necklaces, bracers, bracelets; girdles, earrings, headdresses. Everything and everyone is fighting for your attention, your approval, and (in the case of the vendors) your money— but not in the sort of way that you might see back home. It is doubtless rather awkward. Look at lips and be polite, dear.

Thankfully, your host has Dominion sympathies, and is wearing red and gold, her skirt jangling and her top made of layer upon layer of ruffled satin. Her servants and bodyguards are a crowd unto themselves, drawn in her wake, and she dives gleefully into the narrow streets, pulling you along.

What sort of relationship do you have with Azazuka, anyhow? And, despite the fact that she could probably buy this whole street, what gift do you want to give her before the end of the festival?

***

Zhaojun!

This far into the forest, the rain has changed from texture to sound. The boughs overhead: an awning, a symphony. It almost drowns out the story of the guide, and the story of the guide is this: “On the hottest day of the Hot Season, a rakshasa queen took residence in the shrine of a Loyal God.” That is what the locals call the gods of disease, misfortune, and decay. It does not do to attract their ire; better to both flatter them and remind them of their allegiance to the Sapphire Court. “She bound him tight in fantasies and sealed him away. Now we are preyed upon. No charm hung over the door keeps her servants out, and we become weaker and weaker. Half the village has already been spirited away to their larders, caught in their own dreams.”

The guide’s hair is long and straight, falling in a curtain. Her conical hat shadows her face, and the light from her lantern plays instead on her simple brown dress.

“Do not be troubled,” the priestess says. Her hair is gathered into an elaborate braid, and her voice is a self-conscious facade almost natural. It would take a keen ear to notice how she leans on her vowels too much, overly enunciating to avoid slipping into old rhythms. “The goddess Zhaojun, descended from Heaven, has already deigned to hear you out.” She is almost clever here. She tries to maneuver Zhaojun into definitive agreement, thinking herself a player of the Game of Generals; to make something concrete of the goddess’s simple marble mask. “Such affronts to the proper order will not stand against her,” she adds, with a flourish of intentional humility.

But perhaps this is too harsh an assessment of Sagacious Crane of the Reeds. After all, not only must she impress this rather singular emissary to the Flower Kingdoms, but there is a unsettlement running down her spine, and not simply the excitable one that is caused by being so close to Zhaojun. No, this is a more dangerous feeling, a premonition of danger. The way the sound of the rain has become a distant roar, a dome of calamity out of sight; the soft and lulling sound of the guide’s voice; the knowledge that if she fails, she risks not only imprisonment in fantasy but also the displeasure of the Sapphire Mother and Heaven itself for allowing harm to come to Zhaojun.

So she armors herself in control. Surely she can make Zhaojun understand the esteem she is held in here, that the Flower Kingdoms are not some barbaric backwater but the most vibrant and blessed land in all the world. Surely, with such a subtle nudge, she has committed Zhaojun to defeating the fairy rabble and made her feel good about doing so. And surely she has nothing to fear, as a priestess of the Sapphire Court and as the companion of Zhaojun herself.

Surely.

***

Kalaya!

The cup shatters when it hits the support beam on the far side of the hallway; an unlucky thing, that. If it had hit paper, it might have just caused a tear and then bounced onto the reed mats. But now the cramped hallway is covered in small shards of white-glazed porcelain, and there are shards stuck in the hair of the crying server who narrowly avoided being hit in the head by it, and from the sound of the hoarse roar that comes from the private room, the breaking of the cup didn’t even make its occupant feel any better.

The inn’s owner, a grey-haired woman with a bent back from years stooping in the garden, gives you a look that’s half pleading and half exhaustion. You’ve already had the discussion; nothing more needs to be said about what lies beyond.

Petony, the Tiger Knight, needs to sober up.

She’s drinking them dry, clearing out their larders, and she’s got an entire retinue accompanying her. While it would be dishonorable for her to react to requests to leave or at the very least pay her tab, her hosts are very much aware that she is unstable, armed, and in a destructive mood. Having the moral high ground wouldn’t help rebuild an inn, or even an entire village, if things spiral out of control.

Which is the real variable, if things come to blows. You, against a drunk Petony and her warriors, most of whom are either also drunk or very high? A dangerous fight, but one you might still win. But rather than considering victory, consider the risk of collateral damage if you move incautiously.

What do your stories have to say about Petony’s conduct? What is expected of you in this situation, as a knight and not a princess? And have you ever fought a knight before?

***

Giriel!

You are not in Golden Chrysanth officially. But this teahouse is not so far away, and it is closer than you have been in some time. Outside, the world is lost in the grey veil of rain; inside, it is warm, the world lit in oranges and yellows and reds. It is like taking tea in the heart of a fire, but without the fire.

Cathak Agata is fire enough for all, anyway. She is not like the last emissary, the one who was all self-importance and furious commands. The Red Wolf is an invitation to admire, to come close, to burn yourself on her. And her smile is so impossibly innocent that, even knowing that she is dangerous, it is difficult not to wonder if you have been misled and that she is exactly as she presents herself: a heroine fumbling about in a strange land, eager to learn from you.

“There are so many subtle changes in this season, don’t you think?” The lanternlight plays across her speckled skin. Her hands are... her fingers are, well. Nice. She brushed them against the back of your hand when she offered you your cup, and it’s hard not to let your attention drift back to them. She guilelessly takes another sip before continuing. “I’m not a magician. But I’m in awe of you and what you do. It’s like being a diplomat, a scholar, and a gardener all in one.”

Being around her, the warmth is... comforting. Seductive. Easy to yield to. The warmth simply wants you to use its energy to act. The Red Wolf simply needs to nudge your desires into a place that is convenient for her. How much of that are you aware of, as a student of essence and enchantment, and how much is just the witchy instinct in your gut, and how much is it still managing to slip by you anyway?

“And that’s why I’ve come to ask you for a favor. But first—“ She waves over one of her slaves, who wears a fine robe and a gleaming golden collar, who sets a box down on the table. The Red Wolf opens the exquisitely carved lid, and packed tightly inside is all the night sky. The fabric is impossibly soft, plush, inviting you to sink into it; the constellations above Scarlet’s mountain are delicately stitched in tiny diamonds and fine golden thread, and the moon is an empty circle of silver leaf. The cloak’s clasp is the Imperial Eye, done in jet and gold.

“It’s yours,” she says, and pushes the box forward. “As a sign of my gratitude that you were willing to meet with me. I’m sorry for the quality; it was the best I could get under short notice.” Her sheepish smile is a snare; her carefully unartful humility a trap. But can you really pay attention, when the gift is the sort that princesses would envy to see you wear?

To deny the gift of the Red Wolf in her presence is difficult enough for socialites and princesses. To reject it, politely or otherwise, you must Defy Disaster; if you accept it, give her a String from your heart.

Ten thousand frenzies from the sky. Each raindrop yearns.

THIS is what it is to be a GOD. To feel the YEARNING of the natural world. To feel the craving of the leaves for the sun. To feel the hunger of the earth for the sky. To feel the imperious craving of the hundred-billion parasites that scratch and claw and chew at the mighty roots of the trees. And above all in this, the season where the sea and sky are one: the desire of the rain! Each falls in prayer, seeking prayer. Let me strike the face of a maiden, they cry! Let me be the first raindrop to fall upon the face of a newborn rooster, their first and eternal taste of life! Let me crash against a leaf and knock a beetle from its perch so that it might scream its devotion to me as we fall entwined into the earth! Let me! LET me! Let ME!

The rocks below her feet strain and yearn for the kiss of her shoe. Let me chip and break and tell a story forever that it was you who broke me! Let your foot fall into my mud and shape this path forever with your footprint! Crush my delicate newly-sprouted stem and punish me for defying the Law of Man and Gods by daring to grow upon a sacred path!

The rainforest yearns. The world yearns. The sun and moon and skies and everything yearns, governed by the timeless stars of blue above. No clouds or rain can hide the constellations from her now. Even her own falling gaze is insufficient. She feels them against her skull as they shift and move, ascendant and descendant at all times and at all places. The Musicians. The Pillars. The Lovers. The Ewer. The Peacock. Once a King upon an empty field said: I am, that you might not be, and within that cosmic decree were the seeds of love and violence and otherness and uncertainty and not. Even when the heavens burned and the King fell, unable to drag all down with him, his decree was still enforced. If anything, it was enforced even more diligently for now the decree reigned alone, having overthrown the King who made it.

So what is it to Zhaojun that these mortals yearn too? What is it to Zhaojun if some part of her yearns? All things yearn, and what they yearn for is not theirs to decide. If her masters decreed it she could teach this mere guide and this mere priestess that they belonged at the feet of the fae. That they belonged at the feet of Zhaojun. That they belonged at the feet of each other. Such was the administration of Heaven and such was their luck that they were not to be corrected.

Yet. The constellations ran through her hair like fingertips. The Maidens might ever change their mind. They, too, yearned.

The rain yearned for her face. Her mask denied it. The rain yearned for her skin. Her parasol denied it. The rain yearned for her blue-glowing spirit lantern. Its heat denied it, cloaking her in an ethereal haze of steam and mist as it sizzled away before it touched the eerie metal. Not every love was worthy.

"You do not comprehend the natural order, sister Crane," said Zhaojun to the priestess with a smiling voice. "I did not either, before I [met/became/submitted to] the Goddess. You seek to build cages with your words; insufficient. Only good for caging other words. Build cages with your heart, your mind, your body, your soul. Why else send a priestess to deal with a god rather than a common minstrel?"

[Center of the Web: What does Sagacious Crane of the Reeds love the most?]

Giriel raises the porcelain teacup to her lips with a hand that makes it look so small. She ought to swallow the whole thing in a single gulp, but she savors it, the steam from within joining in its slow entwining way with the gray veil without.

That teacup is her only defense. She can, politely, say nothing, so long as it touches her lips. It would be the height of rudeness even of a Cathak to interrupt a woman tasting a freshly brewed green with delicate hints of chrysanthemum and jasmine.

She knows that once she lowers it, she will accept the dress. What matter that a gift packed so tightly is an omen of long entrapment? Or that Red Wolf is, in her entire symbolism, the embodiment of the seductive flame that burns all who touch it in rapture? She’s not even trying to hide it and that’s really the point. The flame isn’t seductive if it’s hidden and distant. It is seductive because it dances naked right before your eyes and nothing stands between you and its warmth.

But this is the thing, she knew all this before ever taking a meeting with Cathak Agata. Her reputation preceded her. And while she might give off that air of uncertainty, that too was part of her symbolism, one of her key tools in fact because it meant that people gave her the right context to do her magic rather than run in with swords drawn. But she had taken that meeting anyway because...well, she wasn’t exactly sure and she hid that behind the tea cup, which really was very good and deserved several seconds of being slowly savored.

Perhaps she had taken it merely because she had been asked. Someone important needed a favor from small town witch Giriel Bruinstead? It must be something very specific to her talents and if someone this important needed that, well, that must mean there was a very important ghost up to mischief or some divination that needed doing and was specially up her alley. Whatever it might be, she had more or less resolved to do it because it needed doing before ever coming to the tea house. Now, in that context, how could she possibly refuse such a kind and lovely gift? Even seeing the entrapment it represents, how could she?

So she lowers the teacup gently and carefully, and then offers Red Wolf a broad smile. “This is far too kind a gift for me” she says, making no move to push the box away. A humble acceptance, rejecting in words while taking no action. Even as a foreigner, Red Wolf would understand the gesture and the girl with the box would move to place it with Giri’s belongings that she might try it on later.

Gosh, who would she pose for? S-she needed to think about that but later!

[Red Wolf may take a string and make her request.]

Petony. She who single-handedly broke the lines of the Blue Marsh bandits, who broke open the Amber Vault, with her bare hands it is said, and freed the slaves within? Yes, the stories speak plenty of the firebrand courage of the Tiger Knight. They also tell of the legendary revels that followed some of those greatest victories. Parties that would go on for days, with food and drink flowing until none were left standing.

The tableau in front of her now is a far cry from that storytale grandeur. But still, it's Petony! Kayala wouldn't let this pass up even if her oaths didn't require her to help (And they do. After all, what Knight sees the weak in fear and need and doesn't work to defend them?)

And why would you need to ask if she's fought a knight before? I mean, the answer is yes - but those were mostly in controlled bouts once she ran out of soldiers to practice on. That said, there's going to be no fighting here! She's just going to go in and join them for a drink.

Bold as tacks, she lets herself into the table before bowing to the Tiger Knight herself.

"Petony-Phraya" she says, a bright grin lighting up her features. "Would you do me the great honour of allowing me to join you for a round? I would not normally intrude, but could not give up the chance to see the fabled Tiger Knight in person."

Piripiri enjoys herself, in spite of herself. She slurps down the last of some spiced noodles, the wrong kind of spice, they should be a low heat that builds like at ho- and that thought slams behind a ironwood door that locks, yet again, and she swallows. They were... good noodles, yes, that seems safe, and while nobody here seems to have any sort of noble modesty, it's not that she hasn't seen the common folk revel before. Her hood up, a half-veil covering her eyes (gray, of course, don't offend the locals by claims to priesthood you do not have), hands carefully gloved, her lips painted a matching gray to recede into the background, an umbrella patterned subtly so as to not draw attention as unadorned or as the fanciest of the lot blocking the rain from it's furious assault on the ground. There's music, there's great cheer through the street, and while none of the smells are the right smells, they are delicious smells regardless, and her host has been most welcoming.

What is their relationship? Why, to everyone on this street, they are newly in business, exporting the fine woven cloth of this area to Hymair for her house to sell and become the stronger for. Of course, like any good outfit, there are layers there. Beneath the surface, of course, there is the dance of Dominion agent and Dominion aligned, looking for loyalty or at least purpose: it's not like we all work with them for the same reasons, and a loyalist, a oathbound, and a opportunist walking alongside each other will end in folly. Then there's the layer of a merchant willing to sell intelligence, nothing harmful, for the right price, as all great merchants do. Under the polite and friendly relationship, they are sizing each other up, wondering if they can be associates, business partners, or even the rarest of treasures, friends.

But the polite and friendly thing to do when one's host is as attentive as Azazuka is to give a gift. Not a bribe-gift, not a friend-gift, a gift of thanks, and those need work. Which is why Piripiri has her eye out for just the right kind of flower, not a bouquet, a single flower, to pair with the poem she's composing in her head. The understatement is the point, after all: you cannot out-spend one so much richer in coin than you, so you must compete in another form of richness.

Who cares about a stupid umbrella?

By the time the sun rises, every waterway will flood with gossip. Did you hear? Do you know? Vermillion Beast of Lanterns struck again! Terrorized an entire village, she did. But how? But why? Wasn’t there a whole guard of the Dominion’s finest staying there? All battered! All beaten! They say she batted them aside like they were nothing. Their swords shattered against her hide. Their hearts melted at her terrible voice. The last one fell, groaning, and she vanished into the fading light. Nothing! They could do nothing! Fear the Beast’s wrath!

(How brave, how brave, they’ll say, that the soldiers would fight so the villagers would be spared. How noble! How heroic!)

Nobody’ll be talking about an extra umbrella, scattered amidst the rubble. Too plain a design to even notice; deep forest green, dotted with tiny, scarlet flowers. Blends right into the mud. Pretty bad umbrella, in the end. They’re supposed to be for showing off. Or telling someone you don’t want them getting wet.

So who cares about a stupid umbrella?

The priestess, apparently. Of course she’d care. What blue-veiled busybody could resist such an opening? ‘Oh, dear, what a terrible thing! No umbrella! Don’t worry, I’ll graciously let you share mine. Aren’t I such a bright, shining, kindly help to all? You may thank me at your convenience, while I tell you all the ways your life’s gone wrong.’

Han didn’t need your umbrella. She had her hat. And a hood. Which were perfectly fine, and keeping her dry enough. But despite two whole layers of Don’t Talk To Me, and a vast array of danger signals perfected over hundreds of years of highland tradition, her coldest shoulder had company.

(Press against her, feel her tighten. Brush her knee, feel her start. Not to recoil. Never to retreat. Tense. On edge. High alert. A tiger, coiled to pounce. Or flee.)

She could try to keep ignoring her. She ought to keep ignoring her, until she got the idea and left to find easier praise. All she’d have to do was nothing. Sit, on a barge, in her own land, surrounded by some kind of fancy rain-activated perfume (worth more than everything she owned, no doubt) while an unwelcome visitor blabbered pretty lies in a voice oh so effortlessly high-class.

Just that. And nothing less.

Han half-turns to meet her, one sharp, emerald eye peering from beneath hat and hood, pinning the nosy priestess to the deck with her stare. “Tired of attention, bud?” A growl ripples through her voice. Innocent bystanders strongly consider scooting away. “You wanna run that by me again?”

Go on. Cut to the chase.

Tell her why you’re really here, priestess.

[Rolling to Figure Out a Person: 5 + 6 + 0 = 11. First question: What do you hope to get from me?]

Zhaojun!

It is said that the language of Heaven is wreathed in flame. It is said that it is written in glyphs that are left open to the reader’s interpretation. It is said that the first language was created as a tool of control, command, and as a method of expressing yearning. And all these things are true.

But still, Sagacious Crane must be commended for only flinching a little as her mind struggles to process a tripartite verb, with the knowledge that she heard three meanings and one sound. From her composure, she has heard such language before; from the way the rhythm of her walk falters, she does not have familiarity with it. But she does not fall to her knees in awe and surrender understanding in favor of rapture.

“A marvelous saying,” Sagacious Crane says. She does not say— oh, I see. Neither does she say— I do not understand. The careful words of a woman trying to buy herself time to puzzle out a meaning.

Her desires are so simple, though the reasons and meanings behind them writhe like the bright-banded serpents of this land. How she wants to be commended, or at the very least, told that her service was acceptable. How she longs, too, to see the mighty goddess Zhaojun lay the goblins and the rakshasa low with some peerless display of celestial skill, one that means she will not have to apply herself in battle, for the priestesses of the Sapphire Court are not peerless martial artists, relying on the assistance of small gods to defend them— and here, her only weapons will be her sash and her arms, which she does not value, despite their strength and shapliness.

That desire is a ready-made snare. All one of the rakshasa need do is pull on that string and Sagacious Crane will be lost in dreams of the goddess’s victory. How far will she follow in a daze, witnessing Zhaojun defeat ever more improbable opponents with a fearsome array of second-forms and true revelations of mien, even as the goblins swaddle her in silk and carry her down below the earth, there to be both wine and glass for their feasts?

To defeat the fair folk from beyond the world’s rim, you must fight above your desire, even one as simple as the guide’s, who wishes merely to be a good guide for honored guests. You must be able to see through their beautiful lies, though they offer you the fulfillment of your heart. And then, too, you must be able to outfight them. A difficult task, indeed.

“We shall build a cage for them,” Sagacious Crane concludes, her mind still clouded by a dread of what is to come. “I shall submit myself to your wisdom, radiant star of the dawn, whose light pierces the dark and brings revelation.”

As for what she loves most? The light of Venus is pervasive, and no desire can hide beneath it. Unpeel her heart of lesser things: her adoration of the priestesshood, her time spent as a silenced novice under the absolute authority of her superiors, her desire to see the Vermillion Beast locked away in a meditative anchorhold beneath the waters of Lake Zenba, her love of chilled noodles with crab meat and finely grated cheese, and (for once, not the cliche of newborn cats) baby monkeys. Underneath all the things she enjoys, there is a precious sapphire, and it is: the second-to-last night she spent at home, eating out of a hotpot with her sisters (who she wants to provide a good example, someone they can look up to) and her parents (who she wants to make proud, who deserve a daughter who becomes renowned and successful and, most importantly, sophisticated in the way they never had the opportunity— thus, the way she strives to scrub her hill country accent clean), in the place she still unconsciously thinks of as home (an inn on a winding road through the hills, a place of a hundred needful chores, a place where she played tag and skip-rope and mock swordfights with her little sisters).

That is what Sagacious Crane of the Reeds loves most, and it is the quiet tragedy of her life that love for her family is what has sent her away from them. When she is the Abbess, she thinks to herself— then she will have fulfilled the dreams of her parents for her life, and that will be the fullest declaration of her love for them.

***

Giriel!

Cathak Agata takes your hand. She reaches across the table, all innocently intense, and squeezes her fingers against the back of your hand. “It’s not,” she says, and the fire is in your hand, now, intense and inviting. “There are lives at stake, and you’re the one who can save them. What is one shabby cloak when compared to the lives of my guards?”

As if noticing the looks she is getting, if not from you then from other customers, she seems to realize that she is touching you for the first time, and then she withdraws. The air tingles where her hand rested against your skin, achingly sensitive.

She sits back, but her eyes still smoulder with Heroic Intensity. “I have been guarding the border of the Kingdom of Rose from N’yari incursion, but in the past month, my soldiers have been haunted. Our iron is no match for the restless dead, and the fear they instill sends ordinary women and men wild with fright. I have dredged friends and companions out of the clinging mud, wrapped them in shrouds and written my condolences to their villages.”

Now you can almost taste her righteous fury, stoked around her brow like a crown— that here is an enemy that will not face her openly on the battlefield, but strikes at her subordinates instead.

“I have reason to believe the N’yari have desecrated highland graves and stoked their occupants to lamenting violence. I have come to ask you to help me set things right.”

That is a very serious claim — the N’yari haven’t been at war like that with the Flower Kingdoms since the Sister-Warlords ruled. But her sincerity is like a brand against your skin, and the cloak lies there glimmering, reminding you: you can be a hero, too.

***

Kalaya!

Petony-Phraya’s eyes are red-rimmed. The dark shadows under her eyes have run in unsightly circles onto her cheeks. She sulks in her great tigerskin cloak like someone half her age, her hook sword lying unsheathed on her lap, a half-empty bottle of plum wine at her elbow.

One of her retinue unfolds from the shadows to remove you: a large boy with a half-shaved head. But before he can lay a hand on you, Petony raises one hand, cowing him with a barked, incoherent command. Then she glares at you like you’re the midday sun.

“Princesses,” she says. The warriors sitting around the long table, legs folded beneath them or sprawled out on the reef mats, nod in agreement. She stares at... no, through you. It’s unlikely she immediately recognized you as a princess. Like, she couldn’t have, right? You’re a brave, bold knight, and you deserve to be at this table.

(How long have you been a knight, anyhow? And what makes you worry she can see right through you anyway?)

“They promise that you’re special, and let you kiss them in the gardens, like you’re sneaking around, like it’s a game. They try to make you stay, make you another one of their family’s tools. That’s all it is. A big scam. We’re just their dogs. Well,” she says, and her voice is rising, becoming piercing, like the mighty war cry of the Tiger Knight, “this dog has fangs, Meli! Down with princesses! Down with liars, pretenders, and royals!”

Drinks are had, and smoke rings are exhaled, and Petony glares balefully at the ring in the wood by her hand, worn by hundreds of cups incautiously placed directly on the table. “Where’s the new cup,” she slurs to herself. “Can’t even... new cup...”

***

Piripiri!

You may be charming. A single flower would do quite well. Just take care not to be too charming. It suits Cathak Agata’s purposes to be reluctantly pursued but never caught by Azazuka, always just out of her reach; you have been forbidden to present an alternative to the daughter of merchants. For if Azazuka were to fall for you?

You would be invited to have tea with Cathak Agata in the Black Spur Redoubt. And you would stay there until certain things were found to have been made perfectly clear. You are not a player in the Game, Piripiri; you are a pawn.

So do be charming. Be an associate, be a friend, but do not dare to be anything more.

“Oh, daaaarling,” Azazuka says, looking back over her shoulder and beaming at you. “Do come look at this! Isn’t it simply delightful?” Her voice has an excitable trill to it, as if she’s seeing everything for the first time, despite the fact that she must have attended this festival every year growing up. And in her hands she has— ah! A model of the entire city, each ward shaped like a lotus’s petal, with the towers of the citadel rising from the center like stamen. The wards fold in on the center, around those towers, revealing intricate decoration in gold leaf, and careful interlocking facets to hold it closed, still in the shape of a lotus flower.

This flower she hands to you. “Here,” she says, as if it is not a completely inappropriately expensive gift. “So you’ll always remember being in the most beautiful city in the world.” The model is warm where she touched it, but not as warm as her smile. One of her attendants opens a purse and starts counting out golden coins as she takes your hand and pulls you along, barely giving you the chance to find somewhere to put the model.

It had better be a very good flower, darling.

***

Han!

The priestess... giggles. It’s like drops of rain dripping from the branches during a lull, breaking the placid surface of a lake, clear and high. If you were extremely attentive, or were one of the mountain witches, you’d be able to notice the subtle echo contained within the laugh, as if it were bouncing around a grotto. But your analysis likely starts and ends with “wow pretty.”

One hand flutters up to that veil while she tries to regain her composure. (Bereft of both hands on it, the umbrella tilts and bonks you on the hat before she manages to get it under control.) “I’m sorry,” she says, “I’m so sorry, it’s just, you’re just like her! Marchi, from— uh,” she adds, inexplicably flustered by herself, “That is, she’s from where I’m from, that general area, not really that close when you really think about it, but there’s this person who is named Marchi and she’s just like that, she growls just like her tiiiiiiger,” she finishes, having been completely unable to find a different word that started with “tie” and made any contextual sense.

“Ugh!” She says. “I’m sorry, I’m talking too much! I just don’t know when to shut up, do I?” Oh. Oh wow. It is very obvious this priestess has never ever met a N’yari. That’s the perfect set-up for one of their punchlines. “I just, okay, you got me, I was lying when I said I came over here because it was too noisy over there, I just... you looked lonely. And that’s what we’re supposed to do, right? Us priestesses. We’re supposed to look out for people.”

Then, quietly, conspiratorially, impossibly, she whispers to you, all uncertain vulnerability: “Am I doing it wrong?”

And that’s when it clicks that, unlike any other priestess in your experience, this little flowerbud isn’t looking to manipulate you and give you a lecture. This is the first time they’ve let her out of the temple alone, and what she wants from you right now is reassurance she isn’t a screwup. But when she came over here? All she wanted was to shelter you from the rain.

But that’s okay, because you’re great at reassuring people. Just the best, right? That’s a thing you know how to do. Just, like, make a joke. Tell her how you’ll shut her up for her, or something. Or ask if, wow, she really is a priestess (because of how not like Certain Other People You Know she is). You have got this on lockdown.

Giriel frowns. It is an honest frown, a straightforward sort of frown. The sort of frown that happens at just the right timing when she hears about disturbed graves that says “gosh that’s serious” and “that sounds like a terrible thing” and comes with a side of “I’m already thinking about how to fix this” all wrapped together in one furrowed browns and downturned lip. Her tea and the dress are both, for the moment, forgotten in that frown.

Cathak Agata ought to be entirely reassured. There is no doubt that Giriel will drop what she’s doing and head out there as soon as it’s polite to leave. She’s certainly not going to bring up any sort of reward or pay or...well the dress is already more than enough and she’s not interested in having chests of gold dumped on her or whatnot. If she solves the problem, she’s earn a few meals selling simple potions to relieve itches and ease sleep to the soldiers and be more than pleased with herself.

She ought to be reassured except for what Giriel blurts out next, the only result of such an honest frown: “If the N’yari desecrated the graves, why are the ghosts haunting your soldiers and not the N’yari?” Giriel frowns, hands pressed on the table. “They must have one of their most powerful shaman’s there! Gosh, I hope, well, I’m sure I could talk some sense into her, no shaman would want to do this, so there must be some really good reason.”

Giriel nods to herself in satisfaction, her bangs bobbing forward, and the frown disappears. “Thank you for telling me, I’ll do everyone I can...er uh, I’ll help everything I can...or I mean, I’ll help everyone I can to help!” She quickly pours another cup of tea and downs this one quickly, hiding the awkwardness of her response and how much Agata had flustered her. Besides, it would be rude to leave without finishing, so she needs to hurry up!

Consider trust: a nonsense concept. Either one yearns so badly one will sacrifice one's defenses to achieve it, or one yearns for defenselessness itself. Either way one has ceded control over one's desires, for what is more malleable than desire? In the paws of a lioness one can be remade to want new and terrifying things. Such is trust! Nothing more than a failure to defend one's own desires!

There is no value judgement attached to that failure, though. It is natural! If you place yourself in a position where you do not defend your desires then your desires were not powerful enough to command your absolute allegiance. As one's heart is run through Venus' crucible the slag is burned away and the steel is alloyed and purified ever towards the transcendent cravings of the constellations! So trust is not a weakness, it is the act of submissively seeking a purer desire!

"Is that so, sister Crane?" said Zhaojun. "Can you render your heart vulnerable? Can you render your charms superior? Can you weave your mind and soul and body into a trap so sweet that it will drown a gluttonous fae who tries to drink from you?"

She doubted it. This was raw sugarcrane, not pure rose honey. Take her, thresh her, purify her in heat and wet and dissolve her in coffee and she could be a pleasant sweetener at best. One couldn't satisfy the hunger of a soul as decadent as her quarry with a snack, even though she was a snack.

"Of course you can!" she said radiantly. "After all, as I said, you are a priestess just like me! Your soul is ready for this duty. You will open like the Nepenthes Thai and enchant the fae so entirely that it falls into you - and as it falls enraptured by your beauty, I shall work its undoing. Each knot you untie from your dress shall bind the rakshasa ten times over!"

[The Mask: 6!]

A good question: When does one become a knight?

Is it the moment your teacher declares your training complete? Or the moment you're announced to the world as one of the latest in a lineage going back generations? Is it the moment one swears the Oaths and spends the night in contemplation with her armour, in the tradition of the order's first founders? Is it the moment one declares in their heart they want to protect those around them, above any cost to herself?

Officially, the answer is the day your liege dubs you a knight. If you use this yardstick, Kalaya has only been a Knight for a month and most of that has been spent walking. But for reasons that largely revolve around trying to banish the memory of a private, begrudging and incredibly awkward audience with her parents, Kalaya would prefer to define herself using "any of the other ones above".

But the thing is, for all the people who have told her constantly that you can't be a princess and a knight, that it's dirty, rough, just isn't done that way and you'll never make it ... there isn't any rule against it.

So let Petony see through her. She is what she is and isn't about to hide it.

And amidst the haze and warmth of the smoke and drink, Kalaya's smile fades a little as Petony curls in amongst herself.

A new cup is dropped to the table, hitting loudly enough to draw the Tiger knight's attention and the hand of the young lady holding it. Perhaps her eyes will take in the embroidery of her suea pat, or the chain around her neck and come to the appropriate conclusions.

"Petony - you have been wronged, and it is not my place to ask how. But you are also wrong." she declares, a hint of fire in her voice. "We are Knights, and the Order of the Thorn is no one's dogs. We serve the people of the Flowers first and foremost. Our worth is borne from the actions we take in that service, not from the hurts or judgement of some princess in a faraway castle."

"Come, is this any way for the hero of the Blue Marsh to talk? For the Ruby Fire of the Dawn?" she says, voice softening and the smile returning. "You can be, are, so much more than that. And the question of what is not dependent on what that princess, or this one at the table, thinks. It's on what you do next."

"So, Petony-Phraya. What will you do?"

[Rolling to give a spiritual boost of self-worth. Basically, "let's not just waste the evening away getting drunk, get sober and go do something knightly!" 2d6+2:11]

The flower is half the gift.

She's telling herself that, because beneath the half veil and the painted lips she's trying not to break into a sweat in spite of the rain's cooling effects on the street. Her family is powerful, and wealthy as a result, thought they don't chase wealth for it's own sake. She was so casually given something that might be an honor-gift between mother and heir-apparent, a craftsman's final masterpiece, or an antique from the days of old. She was told, while being taught notables of the area, that Azazuka wanted for nothing, but to see it in person was a different story entirely.

It would be remiss to not note, here, that Piripiri is estimating at values here. She was taught shadows, not coin, and while she can play a passable merchant she is not one. Stark and austere has been her life under the tutorship of the Dominion, the better to dazzle the lessors when needed. And there is, of course, no note of blush under that hood, for she's been trained better than that, and would be the first to deny that being given a pretty gift by a pretty lady would stir any such feelings. She'd be lying, but that she's been taught to do masterfully.

Regardless. The flower is half the gift. And so she follows her host into the street, carefully tucking away the gift within a deep inner pocket where none will get at it, and works at the puzzle of being grateful without being enticing. She doesn't want to be enticing, after all, there is no small voice that asks what happens if she damns the consequences. She lies to herself best of all.

[Rolling to figure out Azazuka, starting out strong with a 5]

She takes you, priestess. With only one eye, she takes you. All your fumbling, mumbling, giggling, anxious uncertainty, suspicious tiger references, lies, unwise vulnerability, nothing escapes her notice. Not even when she quickly adjusts her bonked-askew hat (the most motion she’s made so far) does her eye leave you. Not once are you free from her gaze. She is watching. She is judging, little bud. And all you can do is squirm, imagining how poorly you’d fare under both those eyes.

And maybe you could spare yourself a little judgement if you could explain to her that giggle of yours. It’s not. You’re not supposed to. Impossible. Couldn’t, shouldn’t, nobody laughs like that, priestesses don’t laugh like that. It can’t be a real sound. It just can’t. And. That’s that. So there.

And, no, really? They let you out of the Temple? Before you turned into a terrible, miserable, useless, stuck-up, well, priestess? That can’t be right. She always thought that was part of the curriculum. Or, at least a prerequisite for letting you in the door in the first place? Wait, no, she didn’t escape did she?

...no, on second thought, not that. Definitely not that. She couldn’t escape her way out of an open field. All alone on a boat full of strangers, and what does she do? Plop her butt down next to the scariest, toughest thug around, pour out her heart, and ask for...oh no what is she asking her for? And what’s she asking her for?! This isn’t her job! Her job’s, uhhh, something else! That isn’t this!

Yeah, alright, she did ask. A brave ask, if you ask her. And a brave ask deserves a good answer. She’s got plenty of those.

Han snorted. A rough, gruff, ugly laugh. “Doing it wrong? Sprout, you’re not like any priestess I’ve ever seen. First one to ask for a review, that’s for sure.”

The highest, most obvious praise she could offer.

Nailed it.

Giriel!

Of course, taking the time to finish the tea meant that Cathak Agata— her fires now merely a smolder, paying as much attention to the hazy rain outside as to you— is able to answer the question. You are unable to escape with that loose end dangling.

“I’ve asked myself the same question. As I said, I am not a witch, and I wouldn’t do you the dishonor of declaring to you the answers that you and your peers glean from the supernatural world that surrounds us all. But I imagine that being raised from the dead through desecration is much like being suddenly woken from slumber; and the shamans of the savage cat-women know your idioms better than we do, being your guests far from home.”

For a laywoman, not a bad guess. It’s certain that things are more complicated, but she has given you a hook for contextualization: that the ghosts of the highlands are being driven to chase off “intruders.” A tactic that would backfire on the N’yari, if they truly intended to linger in or pass through the land they drove to haunting, but— it is possible. Not certain. But possible. Fools and arrogant women alike call up what they cannot put down. That’s what falls to you, then.

“Now, Lady Giriel,” she adds— oooh, Lady. “I have one more matter to ask of you before you leave. I’ve heard that you are one of the best interpreters of omens in this land.” How thoughtful of her to word it in such a way that you aren’t necessarily obligated to correct her and tell her that Peregrine is the best. “I haven’t had the chance yet to see your methods— would you be willing to read my fate?” And here she smiles like a wolf, beautiful and perilous.

***

Zhaojun!

The occupied shrine looms suddenly around a turn in the bend, heaped up on the high earth like a vulture clinging to a crag. It is lightless, bereft of lantern or candle; the shadows cling to wooden slats and coil within the inner shrine, its doors opened. There has been desecration here, a perversion of Heaven’s laws. In such a place, even a celestial emissary might be— vulnerable.

The steep stone steps are mossy and wet, and the shrine is bereft of keeper to sweep it dry. The guide’s feet are sure, but the same cannot be said of Sagacious Crane; she stumbles and catches herself on Zhaojun’s sleeve. She stammers apologies and thanks, muddling them together, and then continues:

“...and of course I know the steps of the Husband-Seducing Demon Dance, and the Lotus-Arousing Sequence, and the Removal of Petals— which, yes, that would seem to be— I do not have the special raiment, but I am trained in the classical arts, as every priestess of my rank is expected to be, so that will be only the most minor of difficulties, o gracious and cunning Zhaojun...”

And so the three of you come to the shrine’s courtyard. Black fingers tighten on slats; a low hooting and screeching fills the air as the uncouth goblins, the bandar-logi, multiply in the shadows, each bone-white face in the midst of a dark mane ducking away before it can be seen. The guide takes up a fallen drum as Sagacious Crane lifts her poncho over her head and tosses it with practiced disdain to the stones; her top is covered in a river of beads, small and precious drops of lapis lazuli charting the deep current from shoulder to hip in amongst the many lighter glass beads in turquoise and sea-green.

She takes it by the hem and, with a shimmer of beads, with a circle of her hips, with pride in her goddess rather than herself, with a carefully-hidden seed of insecurity that an innkeeper’s daughter would be found pleasing in shape and motion to an emissary of Heaven, Sagacious Crane lifts the top a fatal fingerwidth, revealing olive skin around a stone-pierced navel, and begins her circuit around the courtyard, her eyes flashing, her feet never still, and one by one the bandar-logi grow perilously quiet and begin to emerge by their ones and twos, long limbs splayed as widely as their curling fingers, obscenely scuttling and peering at Sagacious Crane with their dark eyes.

One takes up the drum from Six Sounds Starving and continues to play without missing a beat, as the guide melts into the mist and the moment, as Sagacious Crane reveals the merest flash of her breasts’ underside and bandar-logi tumble down from rafters and flash their fangs in response, unable to tear their eyes away as the curves are again lost in a haze of beads and a spin that sends her skirt billowing.

She trusts in Zhaojun, but that trust is simply an extension of her trust in her training and order, which itself is an extension of her trust in herself, that she has chosen correctly, to the standard that she can expect from herself. If she is right, then the priestesses above her, who assigned her to this, must be right, and if they are right, then Zhaojun is right, and if Zhaojun is right, then she is capable of defeating all of these wicked things so long as Sagacious Crane keeps them enthralled. Therefore, she must do so; therefore, she has nothing to fear from the rough paws of the bandar-logi; therefore, she dances as if before the sacred idols in the Temple of the Pure Lotus, beguiling but untouchable, serene save for the palpable disdain she has for this audience, which she cannot hide, which both attracts and repels them, bringing them closer and closer in spirals and waves.

And yet there is no sign of their rakshasa-queen. Clearly, there is improvement to be found; why else would the rakshasa remain elusive? Clearly, the sweetener must be sweetened; the snack made irresistible. Or was distraction of the simple bandar-logi in and of itself the goal? Will the priestess raise her head and find no sign of Zhaojun, and disaster if she falters, and disaster when they come close enough to seize her fast— save that Zhaojun find the queen of this dream-hive and rebuke her?

***

Kalaya!

Petony swings wild. That’s a part of her reputation, too; that she can go from high to low quickly, and from low to high just as fast. And attention from a princess (who is also a knight) perks her up like a tiger who’s scented something delicious to eat.

Soon enough she’s back to laughing and lets you carefully maneuver her cup away from her. “I’m not one of the Twelve,” she says, with something almost approaching humility to those legendary knights, “but I’d go blow for blow with any one of them! And we should show the little princess— the little knight here some real action before she realizes it’s mostly flower wars and court politics!” Say what you like about Petony; she has the loyalty of her retinue, who roar wild and happy as she springs to her feet, cheeks flushed and smile dangerous.

Take a String on Petony or a benefit, and then— quick, before she leaves the room— figure out how you’re going to get her to pay. She’s supposed to have credit from her kingdom, but she’s on the outs with Rose, and she’s been racking up a major bill here, what with all she’s been drinking. An appeal to chivalry might work, but that’s still very easily a downer to her mood— and Petony swings fast.

“Say,” she adds, while you’re still thinking, “what kingdom are you sworn to, what princess caught a princess? Is it Hyacinth? It had better not be!” She throws back her head and laughs.

The Knights of the Accord of the Thorn have always been sworn to sisterhood in principle, but to the various kingdoms in practice. Thus, your sword-sister one day may be your enemy the next. This, when combined with the divisiveness of the Flower Kingdoms, means that talented knights are sought eagerly by the kingdoms, and kept close through chains of love as much as by loyalty. Many a princess has been instructed to seduce a talented knight into accepting her parents’ offer.

(This means that you, yourself, likely have: insight into the situation with Princess Meli and how her dalliance with the Red Wolf has threatened her kingdom; Opinions about the Red Wolf using her troops as mercenaries without lasting allegiance, which is making royal politics even more unstable; explaining to do about your relationship with your own kingdom and how it has nothing to do with fancying your sisters.)

***

Piripiri!

So. Here’s an idea. An idea inspired by making it to the end of the street and seeing one side fork off down a switchback to the very edge of the ward’s petal, and the barges coming and going, the people releasing lotus blossoms on the water, the people taking their lunch or their tea out on the water, and, ah, the freedom, the comparative privacy, the lack of places for Azazuka to buy you more gifts and put you into even deeper debt! The kind of place where you can look at the city again from the outside, all lit up in the rain, and sneak glances at Azazuka’s warm, beaming face (because glances are all you are getting, ma’am), and work hard on figuring out that present without a host of distractions on all sides: street vendors and people pushing past and outrageous umbrellas and landmarks and all of that, left behind you as you’re poled out into the vast lake around the city.

It is, in fact, such a flawless and excellent idea that you will receive XP if you choose to do it, maneuver Azazuka down to the docks, and hop into the barge being steered by the young woman with the scuffed trousers and the greasy ponytail. What could possibly go wrong?

***

Han!

It’s not your fault. It’s totally not your fault. It is completely not your fault.

It is not as if, say, you glared a hole through an anxious and vulnerable young woman, letting the moment stretch on longer and longer, giving her more time to compound worry upon worry, until she’s squirming and fidgeting and desperate to know if she’s done something horribly wrong after all, and then you laughed at her and told her she wasn’t like other priestesses and was thus failing at being one.

“Oh,” she says, in a devastated little voice. Her shoulders tremble with effort. “I’m s—“ She chokes on the word. “Sorry for bothering you, ma’am.”

And then? You know what she does? She doesn’t stand up and in a huff lecture you about how good fortune comes to those who respect the spiritual hierarchy of the land. She doesn’t get up all snooty and walk away to leave you to get rained on. She doesn’t even burst into tears so that everybody knows that you, Han, are the terror of every priestess from here to Lake Zenba.

She leans over (and her veil trails ever so slightly against you) as she sets the umbrella down, wedging it against the deck, so that you can keep it when she slinks away. Do you realize your mistake and act while she’s still hunched over you, or do you sit there like a slack-jawed cow until she has her palms on the deck and is starting to stand up, muttering something too small to be heard about having a good night?

For all the might of yearning, it is and remains only half of the cosmic dance. The other half is denial. The fly yearns for sugar; the Nepenthes denies it and takes its life. This requires strength. Strength of will above all, for if the Nepenthes lacked will it would have evolved into one of the uncountable blossoming flowers of the Flower Kingdoms, yielding its treasure to any claws that demanded it.

But the kingdoms lack this strength, just like this priestess lacks it. She dances a dance of power and denial but how long will that last, even against this weak and opportunistic craving? How long would it last if the rakshasa applied its <disruptive> hunger? Not long at all, she thinks. All of the confidence here rests upon her own shoulders and if even one decision in the chain of her life was proven to be wrong it would crack. In the time it took to recalibrate from a shaking of the self the battle would be over and the ropes would be tight.

Zhaojun's arm clashes with Crane's, and her heel sweeps her from her feet and sends her to the mud.

The logic is inescapable. If this maiden's confidence is destined to be broken then it shall be Zhaojun who breaks it. She shall not leave such a critical task to these mere bandar-logi. That would be an abrogation of responsibility.

"Once there was a maiden!" she declared, tossing her hair that flared and floated with blue fire, eyes ablaze with the same. Her voice boomed out, raising and flowing downhill into each beat. "She danced upon the Blessed Isle, and the stars fell from the skies to watch her! She danced upon the isle of Wavecrest and the pirates sailed from every sea to watch her! And then she danced upon the head of a pin and not even the philosophers would bother to contemplate her."

She shifted, flowed, serpentine as she performed the martial kata of the Earth Dragon - but she performed it wrong. Instead of immobile stability her posture swayed; a mountain in motion, a mudslide or an earthquake where the soil moved like the sea. Trust not your foundations, foolish priestess! What yearnings brew within that heart other than complacent trust?

[Figure Someone Out: 7; she may ask one of me.
How could I remake you to become capable of withstanding the bandar-logi?
Truth of Heart and Blade: What are you most afraid of?
One to ask later]

Giriel blushes, almost hunching into herself. Of course, this request ought to have gone to Peregrine. What if she makes a mistake that brings down the armies of the dominion upon them? What if she sees the armies of the dominion falling upon them and it isn’t a mistake? What if she sees them kissing each other?!

N-nevertheless, she cannot refuse. That would be far worse, an unforgivable act of arrogance and insult to withhold her talents now and after such a compliment.

So, taking a deep breath, and telling herself inwardly “Giriel Bruinstead, you can do this” she takes the last drops of the tea and pours it into Cathak Agata’s cup. “Swirl” she says, making it happen by placing a large, gentle hand overtop Agata’s (she tries only to hold, not to brush any skin at all, though she is not so dexterous as to do this perfectly). She lifts the arm up above the head (such presumptuous behavior!) and swirls again, then slowly and carefully moves the Red Wolf to lower the cup, pouring out the tea slowly, drop by drop upon her saucer as she does.

When the last drop falls, Giri moves Agata to place the cup upon the table and only then does her hand release the other woman’s. The lingering warmth pulses through her and she has to resist the urge to flex her fingers and stare at them.

She glances then into the tea cup at the patterns of the leaves. They should form a sign: characters of a name, or perhaps symbols and elements. Patterns of water or fire for various sorts of disasters, trees for new life, heavenly symbols for good fortune, birds and paths for journeys, bones for illness, swords for violence, demons for misfortune (or meeting demons, which meant the same thing) and so forth.

[Divination: 5+1+2=8. Giri sees something interesting about what Red Wolf will face that she does not know. Red Wolf learns the truth and clears a condition.

Also, I apologize for the double roll, but I think this is an Entice as well, for which I have rolled an 11 (6+3+2).]

No? What? Hey! Who in all the hells said she could be sad?!

Whoever it was, Han’d have words with them in a minute. Right now, she was busy pressing herself up against the wood of the cabin wall, hardly daring to breathe lest she topple over the delicate little thing hunching over and across her. A whisper of silk brushed her bare shoulder, but all she knew was a touch so faint and light - the tufted flower of a long reed, reaching out in passing - and lingering, a ghost of sensation. A rainy-day garden had sent its regards. Now, it embraced her. Richness and sweetness and the promise of life, life abundant and thriving in defiance of clouds!

The priestess drew back. Her gifts, she left behind her. Her hand left the simple, wooden umbrella. Han watched it go, across her lap, to the deck, and no. No. No!

And her hand shot out to stop her.

(She’s warm, priestess. The girl is drenched from the rain, and by all rights should be ice cold now, but through the damp her hand is warm over yours. She moved faster than you could see, and yet, her grip isn’t rough. She holds you like...like...like a little brown fox, carrying a Very Important and Precious message in their little jaws. No matter what happens, they will carry their cargo to its destination, and when the time comes they will drop it at the recipient’s feet, and there won’t be a scratch on it. A grip tight enough to hold you, and gentle enough to let you go safely, should you choose.)

“...you’ve done more than everybody on this boat put together.” The words are curt. Forceful. Important. And definitely not forced out as soon as they enter her head. “And you shouldn’t get soaked and miserable because of me.” Her gaze falls away from the priestess, contemplating the rushing waters, the dry deck surrounding them, the sight of her crestfallen face that she couldn’t bear to look at even a moment longer, the sound of the rain. And thus was the product of her musings: “Traveling’s better with company.” Lots of people said that. All the time. Including her. So. Maybe you should say it too? And stay?

The priestess did stay. And stay. And stay some more, without ever actually sitting back down. Which was, in hindsight, a perfectly reasonable response to the sight of a long, red, angry gash on a girl’s arm that she had been successfully hiding beneath her poncho. But perhaps if she’d gotten over her shock a little bit quicker, Han might have had enough attention to spare to the hair on her neck, standing on end, or the sudden absence of the oxen’s tread...

[Han rolls a big ‘ol 6 on Entice. XP abounds!]

"Wait, what? No!" splutters Kalaya. "I am sworn to the Lily because of family and birth, not because any of my sisters ... no ... not like that."

She shudders, and draws a long swig from her mug before standing too. As they make to exit, she notices the inkeeper watching them with the unspoken question on her lips.

"Now, before we go." she says, grinning and indicating the copious amounts of empty glasses "We must first remember to serve those who have served us?"

Inwardly, Kalaya is really hoping that Petony is good for this. While she could theoretically direct it towards her own kingdom's credit, a bill of this size in an inn, barely a month out on the road, would be difficult to explain to her father.

[Will take the String on Petony. Not sure if this is a roll of any kind?]

This is a brilliant idea that cannot go wrong, she's a genius, and she's completely not covering for how inadequately prepared she feels with ego. A nice, non romantic, chaparoned trip on the lake, get away from the hustle and bustle so that Azazuka stops buying her incredibly expensive things with obvious... hm, disregard is the wrong word for how Azazuka is viewing the price. That implies something intentional, a blatant show of wealth. No, she's instead paying no mind to it at all, and in a way that's worse, because she just bought a genuine work of art and then a paper cup of noodles and fried shellfish and then a scarf all in the same mindless way, where the price never even enters a thought.

Not intimidated by that at all, ignore any panic and do the job. Which is simple, don't seduce Azazuka.

So Piripiri slips up besides her host, subdued elegance next to joyful exuberance, and took a second to breath in the hint of the sauce from that paper cup, before speaking up. "As a thought, I think we might get a good view of the street festivities from one of the flatboats, with room for one of your retinue to keep your umbrella aloft."

Zhaojun!

What is a battle between martial artists but a dance by a different name? Sagacious Crane flares into life, her maiden’s heart wounded by this sudden betrayal, for a moment too angry to fall apart; she is not too dissimilar from her sister, if one digs in the right place.

When she strikes at Zhaojun, ineffectually, her mud-drenched sash lashes through the air like a whip. The bandar-logi crowd in on all sides to watch, their heads cocking to one side and then shuddering slowly back upright. They make a sound like raindrops striking bamboo as they do, until the world all around melts into a haze of sound, the pearl that by necessity is formed by the crude world of matter around the things that truly matter.

Ah, Zhaojun! This girl has been molded already, from the first time that she saw an icon of the Sapphire Mother, from the first night she spent blissful and secure in the Temple of the Pure Lotus, from the first day she spent walking the roads of the Flower Kingdom as a rising star amongst her peers. She has been reassured, over and over again, that if she walks this road she will be rewarded, accepted, beloved. She has tamed and sublimated her temper— the very same that flares now. It will burn but a moment before it dwindles into despair, unless it is stoked.

If she is mocked— if she is reminded of her birthplace— if she is challenged for her right to serve her goddess— then she will hold the bandar-logi at bay with the strength of that old and well-buried hurt. But to burn water is a terrible thing. It will hurt her, perhaps more than it will turn her against you; she will go from this place, no matter what happens, and quietly insinuate that the possession was flawed, that the goddess Zhaojun was decieved into an inauspicious and unstable manifestation, that perhaps the Sapphire Court should correct this error.

But left to dwindle, confused and betrayed, she will be helpless before the rakshasa, let alone their servants.

As for her fear? That her peers, her goddess, and her world that she is so desperate to fit into see her for what she is and reject her; that she is not some sparkling gem rescued from humble birth but simply another common stone. That in this place, Zhaojun will judge her and find her wanting, tainted by her birth in the mud between the rocks. Nothing more, nothing less. That is the fear that would drive her to defeat the bandar-logi. Will Zhaojun act upon it?

And how, pray tell, does Zhaojun let slip what she hopes to get from Sagacious Crane, or does she armor her heart and refuse to let anything by her stone face?

***

Giri!

It is very difficult to know Cathak Agata’s true feelings. After all, you are simply a witch; you have not gone on pilgrimage to the far side of the world where her matriarch-ancestor lies and receives the tribute of nations. The gleam of emotion in her brilliant eyes, the one you do not know enough to read right, is like that of a dragon who has seen something it wants. Perhaps it is the touch of skin on skin, your controlled strength, your humility. But more likely it is your sincerity that Cathak Agata wants to take between her teeth until the taste has grown less novel.

Even so, she is not a monster. Take a String on her, and know you have leverage on her heart. Even the judges of the dead may be moved by sentiment; how much more a breaker of hearts?

As for the divination: here, each sign reveals itself. Central, of prime importance: possession, achieving a goal dearly sought. On the outer rim, low, are several symbols that are almost clear if you squint: success in love, victory in battle, to come into possession of a material windfall, the sorts of things that people always ask if you see in their future.

But in the upper right (an unfortunate direction), clear as day, the stain forms a broken circle, a dire omen which indicates the influence of the Broken King. And this isn’t the first time this month you’ve seen it appear, or even this week; the King is on the move (which is to say, his shattered aspects and their infernal hosts have been invited into the Flower Kingdoms to act on the behalf of those who listen to their poisoned words). Conversely, in the upper left, still oppositional, is a mountain, strength, associated with the N’yari. Which means that her goals are opposed by the N’yari, or the highlands in general, or someone or something renowned for their strength.

Which does suggest the reading that whatever she wants will be opposed by both the N’yari and the power of Hell. Which, in turn, suggests that whatever she’s striving for may very well be a good thing. Even if that isn’t necessarily the case, wouldn’t it make you feel better if it was? Better than assuming that the Broken King is stoking her towards a downfall, or that her achievement of good fortune might come at the expense of others.

But you want to know how she leaves you, don’t you? At the steps to the teahouse, that liminal space between light and warmth within and the pale rains without, she stops you, takes your hand in hers, pale fingers curling against your skin.

“When you have put them to rest,” she says, her voice earnest, her eyes shining to blind sense, her grip inexorable, “then come back to me, Giriel. I want to thank you for your service— not just to the Dominion, not even just to me, but to the legionnaires who stand beside me— in person.”

And she lifts your knuckle to her lips, bowing before you in that exotic manner of a foreign knight, and you feel not just the heat of her lips, the steam of her breath, but how one tooth grazes against your skin, promising more, rougher, all of her—

And then she lifts her head, strokes one stray lock back from her face with the innocence of a girl who has just been given her first kiss, and dismounts from the steps, looking back up at you as the rain hisses ever so softly against her cheeks.

If you promise her that you will, if you swear to it, if you understand better than she feigns what she means to reward you with, or if you just become Smitten with her immediately, mark XP. If you hesitate, if you catch a glimpse of the dragon beneath her fair mask, if you let yourself be caught up in thoughts of broken circles and ill fortune, mark a Condition. Either way, Cathak Agata has relinquished her String on you.

But she has not relinquished her intentions on you.

***

Han!

The moment is textured, rich, pregnant with meaning. The way you can feel her fingers, so delicate, underneath yours. The way she stays, as if transfixed. The fact that it is growing darker, and she is a silhouette against the lanterns now, and even if you dared look at her you could not see her expression. The agony, not just of moving your arm, but of being vulnerable.

Then you feel her fingers curl around the side of your hand, and her thumb grazes a thoughtlessly devastating path along the back of your hand, and you hear her hiccup slightly, but you can feel that smile.

It just hurts all the more, literally, when she is yanked backwards off her feet and, as part of the fancy transitive property, yanks you forwards too. You weren’t expecting that, in a moment of vulnerability and overextending, and you end up sprawling into the rain-slick deck as the N’yari acrobatically vault onto the ship from the riverbank.

You’ve seen N’yari before. King’s Crown, you’ve seen these N’yari before, you realize as you retract your throbbing arm. That’s Kigi there; she grabbed the pretty boy from the wedding party who tried to get in her way and is now sitting on him, giggling coquettishly as she pins his wrists to the deck and smothers his face in black-speckled fur. And that’s Hanaha (or “better Han”) menacing the bride and groom, tail flicking as she drapes herself over their laps and squishes the bride’s cheeks in one hand, making jokes about a “matching set.” And, Mother of Lotuses, that’s Machi’s hellion of a little sister, Jazumi, wrenching the priestess’s arms behind her back and lashing them fast (and don’t pay attention to the way her shaky grunt of discomfort hits a note that’s almost appealingly husky, or how her frantic squirming is pulling her poncho tight against her, that definitely isn’t worth noting for thinking about later). Which means—

When Machi hits the deck, the barge shudders. Her huge sword is slung over her back; the chains keeping it in its scabbard are set with labyrinth-charms carved from rough stones, the same as the ones dangling from her braids. The purr of her amusement is a low rumble that sets the water on the deck vibrating. “Look at you, little lowlanders,” she says, her mismatched ears twitching with amusement, earrings gleaming in the lantern light. “Don’t you know there are taxes for using our river?”

“And tariffs!”
“And charters!”
“And fines!”

“Battle-sisters,” she says, grandly, “take your prizes, scent-mark them, and bind the rest fast.” (The little priestess lets out a breathy gasp and squeezes her eyes shut.) “If a voyage down our river is what they want, then it is what they’ll have!”

But you, brave Han, are lying unnoticed in the dark, being rained on, and even though Machi is starting to sniff the air, recognizing a familiar scent, you have a moment to...

To do something. To make the mistake of trying to have a swordfight on a barge (one that Machi will not even draw her sword for); to make the mistake of tackling Jazumi and likely knock the priestess overboard in the process; to make the mistake of trying to intimidate the brats into leaving, because then you’ll be threatening them with a good time.

Really, so many possible disasters unfold in front of you. While you’re picking one— how do you know them, anyway? Have you chased them off, have you saved a sister from them, have you (Sapphire Mother forbid) spent a summer being bossed around in Machi’s sprawling family home in a little frilly apron?

***

Kalaya!

Petony pinches your cheek in a way very reminiscent of your older sisters before she stalks off to arrange payment. And already, you might feel, she falls naturally into that role. But to impress you, more than to follow her old oaths, she pays from her own purse (and follows it up with shaky credit from Rose when that runs dry).

You go forth from that place into the paleness of morning, and you go on narrow roads up and down the gently rolling hills, making together for the border of Rose. Even if Petony has no little love for the kingdom as it is now, the rumors she has heard, of both N’yari on the move and the dead sleeping restless, these prick at her heels even after she has sobered up. Like a turtle her retinue moves across the land, umbrellas interlocked as they follow her.

(They are something like soldiers and something like servants and something like adoring admirers. To be a knight is an ambition that many do not have the fortitude to follow, and so they content themselves with clubs and quilted armor and daubed symbols showing their allegiance. It is for this reason that the great battles between kingdoms, ones that see crowns rise and fall, have the character of a violent ball game as much as anything that could actually be called war. You do not yet have a retinue; you have yet to make your name the seed of a story.)

And you walk together, and you sing walking-songs together as the rain beats down, and Petony lifts her voice up in challenge to the world— and that’s why it takes you so long to hear what’s over that next hill. And then? Then Petony begins to run, unsheathing her hooked sword, and her retinue pull out their clubs, and there’s you working to crest the hill, too, you ready to fight by the Tiger Knight’s side no matter what’s causing the roar of battle just beyond—

Then Petony stops, hesitates, and you can see why, even as her retinue mills about the two of you, looking down at the battle being fought in knee-high water, in rice fields, in the driving rain. On one side, there’s the red-lacquered armor of the Imperial Legion, with their heavy shields and spears, struggling to form a shield wall with only an eighth-Talon’s worth of men. A banner in the Imperial style snaps in the wind as legionnaires force open the gates of a farmer’s compound, putting innocents at risk just so they will have a place to stand and a wall to put their backs to.

On the other side are things that it takes you a moment to understand are actual, real demons. Their many-medaled coats are an ugly bruise-green, their heads hidden under hoods and shrouds, and they grip heavy sabers in pitted gauntlets. The sounds of flute and bell accompany them as they dance, manic, like wasps, sabers rising and falling as they spin and jerk their way through gaps in the line.

(If a witch was here, they could tell you more. That the icon borne, there, is their Promissory, which grants them leave to act in the world, as provided by the warlock who accepted their services. That these are Wrack-dolls, made by the clammy hands of the First General, the soldiers that do not die, for they are dreams of black mud and infected wounds wrapped fast around their scavenged armor. That their warhounds, harrying the crossbows on the flank, are Fathers-of-Serpents, which the eye rejects and abhors, which must be fought by striking where you dare not look. But you only know that these are monsters of story and song, and that they serve whoever summoned them here.)

What is happening below is not the battles you heard about growing up, where champions duel in the midst of their armies, where the defeat of one knight is the signal for their retinue to withdraw and yield. It is ugly work from both sides, the work of iron Mars shining high above the clouds. A family patriarch dares confront the legionnaires about bringing the battle to his land, his home: you see him, his robes white, being tossed down— impossible to tell from the distance if he moves or lies still. Demons set fires to the stone walls about the compound, hungry green flames that lick at and devour the very rock.

Petony’s hesitation is not because she is afraid. It is because her outrage wars with the responsibility you represent: the struggle is plain on her face as she tries to decide whether to charge the demons from the rear, or to charge them and keep going until she has her hands around that legionnaire commander’s throat.

***

Piripiri!

“Have you not been? It’s the sort of experience you have to have, Pipi!” That. That sure is a nickname. And that sure is a way she takes your arm in a way that brooks no dissent, steering you down towards the docks.

And then, the trouble. The trouble is that the street urchin whose boat is closest has a slender boat, and three people would be a tight fit— but what does Azazuka do? Does she wait for one of the larger boats, perhaps a barge, perhaps invite half the docks to join the two of you in festivities?

Well, she considers it. You can see her glance across the lake, survey the boats in evidence... and then take an umbrella from one of her handmaidens, a gaudy pink-and-purple thing of waves. “Why wait,” she bubbles, pulling you in after her, handing the barge-rat (who has an actual rat peeking out of her vest?) a gold coin ten times what the trip is worth. “You must see the city from the lake in the rain, there’s nothing like it,” she adds, and then claps her hands together so suddenly that the barge-rat fumbles her pole and nearly loses it. “And the lanterns! Melai, go and fetch us two paper lanterns! We can release them on the water and add to the lights all about the city! It’s the sort of experience you must have.”

But that gives you a moment, standing in the boat with her and the little barge-rat, with her bodyguards glowering at you and your pilot, and time enough to second-guess yourself (and third-guess that second-guess). You should insist on a chaperone, even if the thought of impropriety (seemingly) hasn’t crossed her mind. Just so that there’s no way she can use it as a weapon, or that it can be used as blackmail.

But what if she gets offended and invites you to go by yourself? Or what if she’s actually scheming and intends to seduce you out there on the lake, bribing the street urchin into staying silent as she plies you with kisses and— hey, stop thinking about that! The fact that you would even think that is why you need to have a chaperone!

Oh no Melai is coming back with lanterns, you have to choose! Make a scene and risk hurting your business partner’s feelings (and after she bought a treasure for you, ungrateful thing), or stay quiet, despite the fact that anything could happen on that lake?