In the weeks leadng up to wnter court, a letter is delvered. Atop the letter the kanji for Tree has been writ large.

The crows were singing. With the fighting concluded, the orchard turned battlefeld had become their theater with an audience that lay completely silent as if to fully appreciate their melody. Beneath a tree, two souls rested next to each other. Hours earlier, they had stood tall; their armor gleaming in the dawnlght, their clan's colors upon their back banner soaring in a rise wnd as they faced each other from opposite sides on the field. But as Lord Moon crept closer to the field, it was much harder to see the differences. Covered in the mud and blood of the day's events, one could be forgiven for being unable to tell which side of the field one had been standing on just a short while ago.

"Do you ever wonder why?" asked the first to the second in a voice hoarse from a day of shouting orders.

"Why what?" replied the second, their own voice laced with fatigue.

The first gestures towards the field that the burmakumin were slowly harvestng.

"Why this? It was not too many summers ago that you and I were children seeing who could climb higher in this tree." they responded.

Between Summer and Winter,

Soshi-ke no kaishin Miura Eiji

Soshi Eiji wrote: ↑

Thu Jan 02, 2025 7:09 pm

snip

The return letter brings them even closer to the opening of court.
Pale cream paper is folded into a rather standard note. Pressed within is a leaf in the midst of change, mostly yellow with mottled green specks and more green along the leaf veins. With botanical knowledge, or brute force checks against the trees in most gardens, it might be recognized as coming from a flowering cherry. The flowers, of course would have been instantly recognizable as the beloved sakura of many a spring viewing party. Tidy calligraphy covers the paper precisely.

Greetings, fellow traveller to the Empress's court, Soshi Eiji-san,

A tale much invested in transitions--day into night, life into death, youth into adulthood, as we progress to a court where there will be a great deal, I think, of wagering on who can climb higher in advance of expected transitions. Thematic to the season as well, though perhaps unwelcome there. Few wish to meditate on such direct reminders of our brief seasons in this realm.

Your spirit beneath a tree truly answers its own question, as so much of what presses children to compete is the same drive creating conflicts that end up as battles. To not already understand the meaning of the short beauty of the sakura's blossom and leaf, attached to the enduring trunk that grows and provides beauty in all seasons, reveals a spirit with lessons yet to learn. They'll return to do it all again.

What lessons are you reaching for then?

In curiosity,
Hoshiko of House Yamata of the Asahina
<stamped with chop of same>