Session23
Snow and Hot Water pt 1.
After returning to Toshi Ranbo from the incident at Kurayami Mura, Magistrate Bin went back to the business of collecting the Emperor's taxes; harvest time is a busy period for any Emerald Magistrate in Rokugan.
During this period, Kitsuki Akito returned from the Dragon mountains bringing with him Kitsuki Ukira, the young and somewhat spoiled son of the Kitsuki family daimyo; Akito was given the honour and responsibility of introducing the young noble to the world outside the mountains and trying to shape his personality such that he will make a fine leader when his time comes.
After weeks of storms, heavy rain and the bureaucracy that marked the autumn for the Magistrate and his team, the weather began to chill and plans had to be made to move north to the Phoenix Winter Court at Shiro Gisu and Isawa Bin's wedding to Isawa Toshiko. After a few days of preparation, the Magistrate's party began the long journey.
After six days travel, stopping off at numerous towns, castles and road-houses on the way, the samurai and their retinue were only one day's travel from Shiro Gisu when a snow storm hit them. Fortunately they were very near the hot springs at Gomori-Jiku where they were intending to shelter that night anyway. After a short but arduous trek through the blizzard, the group crossed the sturdy rope bridge to the isolated village clinging to the side of a mountain ravine.
With the blizzard at its most intense and the visibility very poor indeed, the samurai enter the village's heart; they can see that lanterns are lit in several of the bigger buildings, presumably guest houses for those visiting the hot springs. As they were decided which one to head towards an urgent bell rang out, presumably from the fire watch-tower that could just be seen through the swirling snow. Almost immediately afterwards, light bathed the street in which they stood as armed men through open shutters on numerous building surrounding their position and trained arrows at them. One of the wooden screens on the tea-house in front of them slid open and three armed figures -silhouetted by the light coming from the tea-house- strode towards them. In the grip of the largest and most bulky figure was a small girl who appeared to have a knife held to her throat by the man dragging her kicking form from the warmth and into the cold night.
"Drop your weapons samurai" called the lead figure in a clear, commanding voice "or I will have Shigarami here slit this innocent girl's throat. You wouldn't want that now would you?"
Despite being surrounded by archers, an innocent girl's life hanging in the balance and daimyo's son in their midst, Shosuro Korow decided to go on the offensive and threw a knife or similar projectile at Shigarami, the bushi holding the heimin girl. The weapon hit the powerful looking bushi and immediately drew blood; enraged Shigarami slit the girl's throat and charged headlong towards the group. The man who originally addressed them -presumably the leader- ordered the archers to fire.
As arrows rained down on the Magistrate's party, injuring several members, Korow fled to the shadows of the surrounding buildings leaving the enraged Shigarami in their midst. The ronin warrior effortlessly knocked Isawa Bin to the ground and, pointing the tip of his katana at the shugenja's throat, ordered the party to lay down their weapons and the shugenja to surrender their scrolls. Bloodies and surrounded the samurai had little choice.
After a number of ronin emerged to collect their weapons, the group were led inside the large tea-house to find a tense scene. A number of heimin either knelt at low tables or stood nervously around; amongst them were a number of other people, presumably visitors to the village, including a monk and an elderly Phoenix courtier. Bin and the others were told to make themselves at home in the corner of the room which they promptly did while attempting to tend to each other's wounds; Daidoji Ryou was particularly injured after a couple of arrows slipped between the bands of his armour.
Shut out in the cold, Korow scouted the village while he attempted to evade the ronin who had been sent to track him down. He soon discovered that the rope-bridge -apparently the only route into the village- had been cut; the ronin obviously intended to spend the winter in Gomori-Jiku with them either dead or held as prisoners.
The leader of the bandits, who had not introduced himself, addressed Isawa Bin and made it quite clear that he did not want Korow running lose in the village and persuaded the Magistrate -through the application of threats of violence to other innocent people- to order the Scorpion bushi -allegedly the Magistrate's yojimbo- to surrender himself to the bandits.
Reluctantly Korow approached the tea-house and had his katana and wakizashi taken from him; he was then tied up against one of the building's supporting columns. Gradually the tea-house returned to an uneasy normality with bandits and imprisoned visitors sitting around in small groups talking while a number of heimin served drinks and food, mostly a warming broth.
However, having surrendered as he had been ordered to do, Korow felt that his duty had been fulfilled; he therefore promptly slipped his bindings and make a break for the shelter of the dark night, destroying one of the tea-house's wooden shutters in the process. As the bitingly cold wind burst into the warm interior, shouts went up from both the bandits and the terrified heimin. With an angry snarl on his face, the Boss ordered Shigarami and Monnosuke, his other yojimbo, to tie up the magistrate's group while he addressed the night.
"Korow-san, your actions are only going to lead to more deaths. We have no intention of harming anyone here but we cannot have you running around trying to pick us off one by one. That just won't do and it would appear that the only bargaining chips I have are the lives of your compatriots." Turning back into the now chilly tea-house he concludes "You have one minute to surrender or one of them will die and one every minute after that."
Refusing to be drawn out, Korow remained hidden. After a nod from the boss, the imposing bushi Shigarami grabed Miya Katsumi by the thick fabric of her winter kimono and lifted her feet clear of the ground; as he took her towards the exit -obviously loath to spill blood on the tatami mats- Katsumi called upon the air kami, summoning a tempest of such force that Shigarami was blown off his feet and the front wall of the tea-house destroyed entirely.
Korow, who had been hiding under the tea-house itself used the confusion caused by Katsumi's spell to manoeuvre himself into a position where he could see into the now exposed interior of the tea-house. Shigarami, not amused by Katsumi's unexpected attack, delivered a mighty blow to the samurai-ko's face with his fist, knocking her off her feet and drawing blood from her nose and a cut above her eye. He then ripped some material from his outfit and shoved it into her mouth, gagging her before using more fabric to bind her hands and feet. At this point Korow, who had prepared a poison-tipped dart while under the tea-house, fired his weapon unobserved from the wreckage, striking the bushi -apparently unnoticed- in the soft flesh under the arm...
Last edited on Sunday 30 March 2008 9:32:29
