Sumie - Wet Ink

[TheBrogueadier]

The Onmyoji spread the complicated paper charts out before Akihiko, sweeping his hand across the various and intricate maps with a grand gesture.

“It is complete my lord, how the fates see your life and your destiny”

“Good work Taisei. Tell me then, what does fate have planned for me?”

“It is as you would expect Sir; your services to Lord Mifune will be rewarded greatly! With your strength and his leadership, you shall conquer the splintered houses and ensure the name of Mifune lives throughout history.”

“Mm...” Akihiko leant forward, his eyes dancing over the charts, trying to make sense of the various symbols and glyphs. “And what of an heir?”

“An important question, sir! What manner of fruit grows inside the belly of your wife?” Taisei selected one of the numerous thin sheets of paper, laying it gingerly over the main chart and sliding it into place. Holes and markings on its surface aligned with those on the sheet below. “A boy grows in her womb, destined to become a great warrior, a leader in the house of Mifune and a true heir to your name.”

“Then the gods truly favour me, Maeka. Bring sake so we may all drink to the future!”

….

Akihiko paced up and down the short corridor, the air thick with the strange bitter-sweet almost-taste of amniotic fluid, the sharp zest of fresh sweat and the rusty tang of blood. The thin walls had done nothing to hide the barks of pain, or to still the sounds of ragged breathing that echoed from his wife’s chamber.

A strained half-scream, half sob, sounded from the room, cut off short with a grunt.

A moment later and a new cry started, no longer the primal strains of labour, but the high, thin wail of a newborn child.

Akihiko stopped, listening to the sound of the child, his son.

The panel door slid open, one of the midwives stepped out with her head bowed, focusing intently on the floor.

“Master Okabe, your child is a healthy…”

“Son?”


“No, Master Okabe...” The midwives’ eyes flicked upwards for a moment.

“A daughter.”

[TheBrogueadier]

Half a league onward, All in the valley of Death

The floor of the shallow valley rolled gently away, flattening out to a broad flood plain. Come spring the place would be under a few inches of water, but for now it was an almost unbroken stretch of white. Several inches of windblown snow covered the frozen earth.
Almost unbroken, two ragged and windswept armies stood in uniform groups, facing each other across the snow blown slope.

The bass report of a drum sounded over the landscape, then a quieter drum roll followed in its wake; a signal to prepare. The twelve hundred strong detachment of soldiers from House Mifune, arrayed in regimented order on the slope of the valley, shuffled as they prepared to advance. Weapons were checked, straps tightened and prayers muttered.

The drum roll ceased.

At the head of the unit, Tadanobu unsheathed his sword, sighting down its length at the distant figures of Inouye’s lines.

“Five hundred meters, we advance on the next beat, four strides per beat.”

The drum sounded once more. As one, the soldiers advanced.

In the years since her birth, Sumie had learnt as much as she could, but gender and status had counted against her. With her father well placed amongst Mifune, the onus had always been on a life of marriage, rather than battle. Thankfully Akihiko, despite several years of disappointment in the gender of his first child, had retained some faith in the prophecies of the Onmyoji Taisei, and he had ensured that she had been able to enter the ranks of the Samurai.

Gender meant she had been denied the more traditional intimacies and opportunities of the samurai way; Shudō was, after all, a thing between men. But she applied herself to her tasks, and with time had become a reasonable, if not exceptional, warrior.

“Four hundred meters, keep the pace, shields to the fore.”

Lightly armoured spearmen with vast rattan shields scurried forward, merging to the front and rank of the marching soldiers. A handful of dark lines leapt into the air above Inouye’s men, most falling far short.

“Three hundred meters, pause under volley fire.”

The pace of the drum beats quickened, matching the growing tightness in her chest, and a moment later the first true volley of arrows leapt from the enemies archers. Huddling behind the rattan shields, they listened to the cries of the slow or unlucky.

“Push on.”

Mifune’s archers began to return fire, the dark streaks crossing the skies between both armies as they pressed forwards, the drums quick beat matched for a moment by the reptilian hiss of a thousand blades sliding free.

“One hundred meters.”

The drums beat kept them in check, it held the reins on the desire to close that gap as quickly as possible; it prevented men falling short, or wasting their energy on too long a charge.

A cry went up from further down the line, and two units changed direction, opening a corridor between them. Through the space poured cavalry, an angry brown and white stream of furious steel shod hooves, cruel spears and devastating momentum. They ploughed into Inouye’s ranks, throwing men, shields and weapons into the air.

The screams of combat echoed down the lines, magnified a hundred fold as the advancing troops screamed the charge. The pounding of the great drums forced them on, carried them over the last meters, a primal rhythm that hammered through her body, its hedonistic beat leading her in the gory dance of battle.

Melee, a furious blur of chaos, impacts and sounds and sights; half-muffled screams and yells, blubbering cries and wails, the sound of crying, half-glimpsed faces with looks of fear or pain or agony. Ever staring faces looked up from the snow-bound floor already streaked red and steaming. The ring of metal on metal, the muffled suck of steel on flesh, the hot wet splash and rusty smell of blood and oil, the thud of impact, the staggered and reeling steps.

Then death.