(D4 LA) Lunch, Interrupted (open)

[Asahina Hoshiko]

Hoshiko finds she'd lost track of time digging into a bit of research and ends up imposing on the kitchen for the leftovers from the proper lunch hour. Restorative miso soup, warming after the chill outside, rice balls, tea. It's actually rather pleasant to have room to spread her current scroll while eating in a space less crowded than it would have been an hour before.

At first she thinks a door has been left open, letting in a draft, but after a moment it's strong enough that she reachs out to rest an arm across the scroll, though oddly, it doesn't flutter at all. A few seconds later she's pressed against the table by the gale, bones aching with the cold of it. What in the world...? There are screams in the wind, terrible and afraid. Not this world...or not only this one.

She draws on the calm that lived within her in that place touched by that otherworldly court, breathing deep of the icy wind. Sitting up, she can see the scroll remains untouched by these winds, and her quiet prayers start threading through the screams...that few seem to be reacting to in the room around her. Slowly, she weaves that inevitability, that calm waiting for the next thing to come up, the next life to cycle through into the wind and feels it calm...slowly.

She's trembling by the time it's calmed enough to seem merely agitated, only partly because her bones feel as if they were dipped in the ocean's depths. After a slow breath, she trusts her hand to grasp the teacup, which now feels almost too hot, to sip and imagine it seeping into her bones. What set that off?

After a time to collect herself, she rummages in her satchel for the stone coins in their silk pouch. She holds them in her hands a moment, rubbing them together before tossing them lightly to the table, and leaning forward to see what they have to say about this.


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Step 1: The Rending of the Veil
D4 LA: Step 1: The Rending of the Veil Etiquette/Reflexes VP | 7k4 ⇒ 33 (TN: 20)
Success

Step 2: The Rebuke
D4 LA: Step 2: The Rebuke Lore: Spirit Realms/Awareness | 7k4 ⇒ 67 (TN: 15)
Success

Step 3: A New Resolve
D4 LA: Step 3: A New Resolve Lore: Spirit Realms/Awareness | 7k4 ⇒ 39 (TN: 20)
Success

And some Divination for good measure. D4 LA: Divination about the upset winds! Int/Divinaition | 4k3 ⇒ 15 (TN: 15)

[Matsu Masumi]

Someone as large (but not Large) as Masumi often needed to eat a lot. She might have gotten used to eating lean at home but this was the Winter Court! With the Empress around, there was nothing that could go wrong ever.

But when she arrived, the first thing she noticed was the priestess throwing some coins onto the table. "Is everything alright, Asahina-sama?" All this spiritual stuff wasn't really her forte. The poor lady didn't even acknowledge any connection to Benten most of the time. "Did the kami say something to you? Or... is it related to the other incident?" She didn't even know where to find these intruders in the night. Sae was depending on her! Ack!

[Asahina Hoshiko]

snip

Hoshiko's attention is fixed for a long moment on the coins...one that spins strangely, refusing to settle for a long, long moment and then lies unreadably cocked against her teacup. Her eyes, when they look up to Masumi are troubled. The silk pouch for the coins rests forgotten in her hand.

"Matsu-san?" There's a question to her voice, as if not quite sure what she's seeing. And it's true that the wind and the coin all have her feeling a bit like she's wandered into one of those dreams that almost feel like you're still awake.

Fingers clench on the silk and she shivers a moment. "Ah...it might be. Did you feel anything? The earth remained still...didn't it?" She doesn't sound entirely certain. "But there was a spiritual wind, a gale. Screaming in fear and anger. I can't tell the source." She points to the coins. "But there's a form here I've never seen. Something's here...or coming soon, that should not be."

[Matsu Masumi]

Snip

For a moment, Masumi considered grasping the priestess' hand to snap her out of this trance. That would be terribly gauche, however, so she simply waited. It wasn't like she wanted to hold hands with her!

The coin barely registers in her mind. "Yes it's me. I would be greatly surprised if I turned out to not be from Ningen-do." There must have been some sort of spirit out there that could somehow be tricked by its own lies. That was so, so far from her area of expertise however.

"I have not felt anything out of the ordinary." Any call to action to her had been fully ignored, thus making that statement true. "But the portents that you speak of are concerning. Is there more information as to what exactly this pertains to?"

[Asahina Hoshiko]

snip

Hoshiko shakes her head. "Divining is annoyingly vague at the best of times. And really...we already knew something was wrong and out of balance with that quake." She doesn't think it's proper to say it aloud, but the illness of the Empress could well unsettle the spirits. She'd never been near such an event to have a proper reference for comparison.

There's a palpable frustration. "I wish I knew! Has there been anything odd reported to the emerald magistrates? I know you and Daidoji-sama are here more in roles for your clans, but imagine you are still tied into those networks, yes?"

[Matsu Masumi]

Snip

"I see," Masumi said, too polite to outright admit her annoyance. These spiritual matters were so beyond her purview and yet the permeated through everything around her. Such was the nature of the kami.

"The only thing that would be within that realm is the unwelcome visitor that you and your fellows are keenly aware of." Masumi's nose twitched. "This may not be the best place to discuss such matters however."

[Asahina Hoshiko]

snip

Hoshiko looks up at her sharply. "Wait! What unwelcome visitor? Do you mean spirits or some politically unpopular guest?" She glances around at the other stragglers, keeping her voice down as she scoops her coins away.

[Matsu Masumi]

Snip

Masumi looked away before she could do anything so scandalous as intense eye contact. "No, no, not at all. I meant the intruders a couple nights ago."

[Asahina Hoshiko]

"Oh, those." Hoshiko dismisses the merely physical midnight visitors as uninteresting in the context of the storm. After all, she didn't have to deal with anyone delivering head and hearts in apology. "They're not even visitors. I was hoping there were stranger things. Stuff going missing that's too large to carry and then reappearing. Water running uphill. Confused birds that can't fly...that kind of thing is more in line with spiritual upset, but the magistrates tend to be called first."

"Unless there was something spiritually odd about the visitors, I don't think they're part of the puzzle."

[Matsu Masumi]

Masumi nodded along absently as Hoshiko, the pretty priestess (what?), listed off all manner of unpleasant ideas. "I haven't noticed anything of that sort then. I'm glad that intrusion I mentioned didn't cause you much fuss." She pressed her lips together. "You seem to be a bit less unsettled just now though? I'm not sure if there's anything I can do for you."

[Asahina Hoshiko]

She shakes her head a bit. "Well, I slept through the intrusion the other night, so the fuss was all secondhand."

"Hmm, but yes, the shock of that...wind, passes, as most do. I don't like these omens. But I can't do much with them just now. Thank you." There's a small smile. "Nor much you can do about it either, I suppose. I thank you for the thought, Matsu-san."

[Matsu Masumi]

"Is that so? You would say that things have not been too different then among your fellows?" Masumi took the comfort of the guests very seriously, Haku most of all!

"Addressing any ill omens shall have to be by your capable hands, not me. Well, I will certainly assist if called upon, but I think you understand what I mean." She smiled afterwards, the extremely awkward sort of a Matsu trying to be reassuring. "Hmm, do you think this disturbance you felt affected any of the leftover food?"

[Asahina Hoshiko]

"Not so different," she muses, unsure what the bushi responsible for their safety might be feeling. "And Lady Noriko and her children were unharmed, thank goodness."

There's a nod, and understanding bit of a smile at the delineation of their duties. The question has her looking at her remaining food, which hadn't seen so much as a ripple of that wind on the tea. "I don't think so. Even most of the people here didn't notice it." She considers the spiritual qualities of the food. "One might focus a bit on earth-strenghening dishes to counter the excessive spiritual air, perhaps."