[EE1 - Just around the Riverbend] The Warrior and the Flautist

[Noriaki no Yamadono]

"Kiiiyah!" Matsu cried out as she moved the kata with her large hafted spear. The thing was almost as tall as her father, the long blade on it heavy. Her arms strained with practiced movement, showing her strength, even in youth.

At the same time, Yamadono sat on a large rock. His eyes closed, as he played his flute. The song somber, and haunting. But it seemed to be quite meditative as he did so, paired with the young girl practicing her forms.

[Ongaku no Ryoko]

It was a very nice river. Ryoko found herself coming back to it through the day - after all, it reminded her, just a little, of home.

As she walked the bank again, testing different ways to hold her own instrument, looking for a good way to play on the move, she heard the flute.

Drawing closer, she stopped just outside the distance one might normally say hello, finding a comfortable stone to sit upon, and placing her own instrument between her knees.

Pressing bow to string, she joined in to his song, adding a somber, husky tone to underline the melody he played, almost like an echo, as her bow teased a harmony out to his tune.

Seemingly caught up in the song, she didn't even watch the man or his daughter, her only contribution and greeting coming from the instrument she held - an undercurrent of emotion, hints of lost things and future possibilities, seeping through as she played, as if teasing the flute to reveal what it was holding back, to voice the emotion within.

[Noriaki no Yamadono]

His eyes opened but he didn't stop playing. Moving the rhythm along with the stringed instrument, the tones interweaving and playing off each other, a crescendo of hidden emotions and sadness that was just part of his soul.

In time with the music, Matsu's movements with the polearm flowed like water through a forest, one foot with the other in a dance of death to the sad music.

[Ongaku no Ryoko]

While it seemed the song could go on forever, eventually Ryoko opened her lips, a short poem flowing forth in her tomboyish alto, carrying across the river.

"All things fade, like water down the mountain, yet their tracks are etched forever in the edifice of our hearts. The path they took, never taken again, yet new water will flow without end or start."

Then she fell silent, leaving the flute alone.

[Noriaki no Yamadono]

EE1 - The Warrior and the Flautist - Fluff Music (Agi 3, Perform: Flute 1, TN15?): 4d10o10k3 12

As the Poem ended, and the sad shakuhachi continued... the song broke. A choked back sound from the large man, as the flute was set down. Sadness seemed to radiate from him, as he looked to the practicing girl.

Strong hands gripped the instrument tightly, as he shook his head. Then, without looking to the newcomer.

"Your words deserved better than what I was playing."

[Ongaku no Ryoko]

"The song of the heart doesn't always sound beautiful. That does not diminish it."

She rose, striding over to the man, pausing a short distance away.

"I am Ongaku no Ryoko, and I appreciated your song."

A nod, and a smile, if a sympathetic one.

"I do not know which burden you needed to give voice, but I pray my tune helped you release it to the winds, even if only for a moment."

[Noriaki no Yamadono]

"The same I always carry. My thoughts never drift far from it, and sometimes... it springs forth." He continued, his voice gravelly, whispered. The large man looked to Ryoko, his yellow eyes drawn to the horns for a moment, before looking to her face.

"I am Yamadono. The Last of the Noriaki Tribe. She..." he nodded to the young girl practicing with the polearm, "... is my daughter, Matsu."

[Ongaku no Ryoko]

The last?

Ryoko looked rather mournful. "The last? That is... I'm so sorry. It must have been a true catastrophe, if it took your entire tribe."

She nodded gravely. "It would be a heavy burden indeed to sing the deeds of an entire tribe - so many spirits trusting you to carry their names on to the maker for judgment."

Glancing at Matsu, she added, "You have a lovely daughter - fearsome. I imagine even the elders would be impressed!"

With a somber little bow, she added, "If you tell me their deeds, I can help sing their spirits to rest, if you wish."

[Noriaki no Yamadono]

He chuckled. "Not a catastrophe. Well, depending on who you ask. No. Most of my kin have joined with these clans, taking the new ways. I, while I follow the Spider, am a wreck of an old man, tied to the old world before these gods fell. My world has ended. Matsu..." he smiled broadly, looking to the young girl, "will carry on my blood, but charge headlong into this new one. My tribe will all but be forgotten, as will the old ways. It might be for the best." He shrugged.

"The others would shed no tears for the loss of the Noriaki."

His sadness returned. "My songs are those of her mother. My beloved wife, who saw this beast, and showed him how to be a man. How to live as more than a terror in the night." The somberness fully taking him. "She has been gone many winters now, shortly after that one was born."

[Ongaku no Ryoko]

"Oh."

Ryoko blinked, foolishly, and then quirked her head. "Why do you think your tribe was so bad? I would be mournful indeed if my own tribe gave up our history and ways..."

Glancing at Matsu, she added, "Well... I did not know your wife, but she birthed a beautiful daughter. Nobody would marry anybody for no reason - so don't be so hard on yourself... You still care for her after all this time. You have an ogre's memory, and must have an ogre's strength to carry that burden all these years."

[Noriaki no Yamadono]

"We did not sow. We took from the other tribes. We pillaged and took as we saw fit." He removed his hat, running a hand over the balding crown. His eyes were intense as he focused on Ryoko.

"The other tribes hated and feared us because we would come with violence to steal and carry away. The Seppun, especially with tthe aid of these gods, finally saw an end to that."

Yamadono sighed, looking away, to focus on his daughter. "I have to keep her memory alive, because Matsu was not old enough to remember her when she passed."

[Ongaku no Ryoko]

"Oh?"

She pondered that in silence.

Finally, she said, softly, "Well, it is good that your tribe took a different course, but surely there must have been some parts of the tribe worth remembering - after all, you chose to keep that name, and mere bandits don't stick together so long."

Resting her morin khuuru against a large stone, she sat, a few feet from the man, dusting off the woven cloth which covered her knees.

"Have you spoken to Matsu of her mother... and have you decided what sort of future you wish for her, if she is not to be a Noriaki?"

[Noriaki no Yamadono]

"I have." The older man spoke softly, his attention focused on the fierce little girl. Memories drifted to her riding his shoulders, or helping her walk. The first words.

The first time she held a knife, and helped skin a stag for her fur lined cloak. His breathing was steady, if slow.

"It is not my place to decide her future. She will forge her own destiny. I only pray the Fortunes favor her."

The young girl finished a kata, and lowered the polearm. Resting a moment, then began to move with a fluid grace into another set of moves.

[Ongaku no Ryoko]

"Perhaps she will, but I don't doubt that a father's guidance would help her."

Ryoko glanced at the man. "You clearly care deeply about her future - do you have a path you think would be best for her?"

Taking in the polearm, she added, "She clearly seems to favor martial disciplines."

[Noriaki no Yamadono]

"She does. She has her mother's spirit. And my temper." The large man laughed, then nodded. "I believe she..." the girl let out a kiah, then turned.

"I can hear you both." She called back, slowly marching to the pair.

"I will be the greatest of all samurai." Her eyes narrowed, looking to the pair.

[Ongaku no Ryoko]

"And she has sharp ears."

Ryoko smiled, and then as Matsu declared she would be the greatest, a faint sparkle came to her eyes. Some inner flame sparking at the words.

"A very bold claim, but one I am afraid I do not understand what a samurai is - so I don't know what would make one the greatest."

[Noriaki no Yamadono]

"Honor. Courage. Compassion. Courtesy. Duty. Sincerity. Honesty. The seven noble virtues." She continued, moving closer to the pair, driving the butt of the polearm into the ground.

"The seven tenets. To live to those is to be a great samurai." She clapped her hands. "To understand them is to know you will fail. Father is courageous, dutious, but he lacks a certain courtesy." She glowered for a moment, with bright eyes of love shining through.

"To be a warrior. To know art. Father plays the flute, and I watch to learn. He... thinks he's not part of them but he is!" She yelled at him, before looking to Ryoko.

"I will be the bravest, the most loyal, and the strive for the rest." She stood taller. She was quite tall for her age, and the harshness of their lives showed in her strength.

Yamadono watched her, awestruck. Even as he knew that they both disagreed with Akodo, that there were times you couldn't be honest, you could always be sincere.

"Matsu... you're just like your mother." He smiled, seeming to be broken from the sorrow in his heart foe a moment.

[Ongaku no Ryoko]

Ryoko was taken aback when she yelled, but nodded approvingly.

"Those are all noble goals. If anyone did achieve them all, they would be a great person indeed."

Glancing between the two, she added, "I am not a samurai, but if that is what a samurai is like, I wouldn't mind being one some day."

A faint smile.

"But I don't know if there is a place for an Ongaku in these clans... still, you make a good case on behalf of your people."

[Noriaki no Yamadono]

"There's a place for anyone with the heart, the spirit to be an example!" She stepped closer, then looked to Yamadono. "And you saying you're not part of this new world, thinking you're time has gone? You're acting like you're already dead! Don't you know how much it hurts?" It seemed that something that has been brewing for some time bubbled forth.

"You're here because you believe in the cause, to rescue the missing Kami. And you can't believe in that if you think you're not gonna matter in the future!"

For his part, the large man was taken aback, looking to her, then to Ryoko.

[Ongaku no Ryoko]

Ryoko just shrugged, fixing the man with a wry smile.

"You have a smart daughter, she sees through adult misdirection."

Crossing her arms, she balanced her chin on her left hand, eyes bright with amusement.

"She is not wrong to ask you to use your life for the living - we sing the dead onward, we burn their bodies so that they do not look back. Some day, when we are free to follow them, we will be given the same courtesies. Life is for the living, death for the dead. Burdens given to the wind should not be taken back every time... eventually you have to let them stay given..."