The second preview of the fiction booklette included with Siege: Heart of Darkness is available for your reading enjoyment! Daidoji Gensai stifled a sigh as his companion pulled his horse up short and dismounted, the third time he had done so in the past hour. Studiously trained in the arts of reconnaissance and warfare, Gensai was keenly aware of the need for a scout’s vigilance, but the detail on which he currently found himself was largely unimportant and ceremonial. “I think you have been quite diligent in your examination of the southern boundary, my friend,” he said in an exasperated tone. “Perhaps,” the Lion scout replied, his tone neutral. Gensai frowned. He did not wish to be kept waiting. In truth, despite his training, he found most of his scouting assignments quite uneventful and uninteresting. It was only during war that he found himself in his element. It was ironic, he supposed, that he would be paired with a Lion, the clan to which such an attitude might most often be attributed. And it was beyond irony that his companion, a young Ikoma veteran of the Lion Clan’s conflict with the Yodotai remnant that had plagued the northwestern Colonies not so long ago, seemed more content during peace than war. “What is it that you are looking for, exactly? Because I am growing concerned that we will never reach our destination.” “A scout does not look for something,” Ikoma Takakura said. “A scout looks for anything. My sensei told me that.” “Your sensei was not owed two weeks’ leave in the Second City, I imagine,” Daidoji Gensai retorted. “Honestly this entire affair is preposterous. I have no desire to be overly flattering, but your clan destroyed the Yodotai remnant and your Champion took Legulus’s head herself. Nothing remains of the wretched gaijin. They are eradicated.” He paused for a moment. “I must confess a bit of jealously, if I am to be completely truthful. Would that the Crane had experienced such an opportunity when we combated the Mantis some time ago. I would relish the chance to have broken them so thoroughly.” “You talk a great deal, for a scout,” Takakura observed. “And you seem rather unobservant, if I may say so without offering offense.” “You may not,” Gensai said, his tone growing quite surly. “I find your demeanor rather unpleasant, to be frank. Your constant posturing and grandstanding. Who do you think that you are impressing way out here in the wilderness? If it is a promotion you seek, you had best accept the reality: they do not offer men who spend time patrolling the fringes of the Colonies promotions.” “Possibly,” Takakura said, his tone seemingly unconcerned. “There are exceptions, however.” “Exceptions?” Gensai frowned. “What do you mean?” “Men such as us who find things like this,” he said, pulling something up from the thick underbrush. “They might make an exception.” Gensai gaped and leapt down from his horse without a thought. “What… what is it? Where did you find it?” “An arrow, of course,” Takakura said. “Larger than any I have seen before. Thicker in the shaft, longer by at least a handspan. Weighter as well. I imagine the bow that could fire this would be quite large indeed.” He gestured toward the underbrush. “Seems it struck a deer or some such. A glancing blow, by the placement. The animal lived for a time and fled, but eventually succumbed to its wound.” “You touched a dead animal?” Gensai said, backing away. “Do not be a fool,” the Lion countered. “Of course not. All that remains are bones now, but the placement of the arrow tells me everything I need to know. Except, of course, what manner of arrow this might be.” “I have seen its sort before,” Gensai said. “I trained with the ascetic archers of the Asahina family. They are not as gifted as the Tsuruchi perhaps,” here his tone was bitter, “but they have a more robust scholarly tradition. I have been exposed to the archery traditions of virtually every family or group in the Empire as a whole.” He nodded toward the massive, black arrow that Takakura was studying. “That arrow belongs to a Naga archer.” Takakura looked up sharply, his eyes narrowing. “Naga?” he demanded. “The Dark Naga was driven from the Empire some months ago. This could belong to its forces, perhaps.” Gensai chewed on his lower lip. “The Dark Naga was driven from Rokugan, yes, but far, far south of here. How would they have survived this long, and come this far? It seems so unlikely.” “Unlikely, perhaps, but difficult to dismiss, given what we have in hand.” Takakura hefted the arrow in his hand, as if testing its weight. “You sound like a Kitsuki.” “Let us not ruin our working relationship with insults, shall we?” the Lion said sharply. “The presence of this arrow suggests a number of different possibilities. Most are innocuous, but some I find especially unsettling.” “The Naga are a primitive people,” Gensai said, still chewing his lip. It was a nervous habit he had never been able to lose. “Doubtless some of them survived in the wilderness, but creatures of that size would require large amounts of food. There is no way that a large force could move undetected through the wilderness. This is likely some scattered survivor still struggling to find his way. No significant threat.” “That is one possibility, yes,” Takakura agreed. “Unfortunately, it is not the only one.” He gestured to the skeleton. “The Naga are large creatures, yes, but why shoot a deer to feed only oneself? It is far too large a prey for a single creature. No, this must have been at least a half dozen strong to wish to fell a deer.” Gensai wanted to protest, to insist that there could have been no other game, but he knew that he would be deceiving himself. If there were deer, there would certainly be smaller game. It made his stomach turn to consider eating hare or squirrel, but such creatures did abound in the wilderness to the south, at least according to the scouting reports he had read during his time at the Imperial Explorers dojo studying under Bayushi Shibata. “We cannot know for certain,” he said with a resigned tone. “Our duty is not to know. Our duty is to report,” Takakura said, mounting his horse and placing the arrow in his own quiver. The sight of it sticking out so much farther than the normal arrows Takakura used only seemed to enhance how huge and looming it was. A samurai’s armor had no chance to turn aside such an arrow, Gensai knew, and he shivered at the thought. “We must make all due haste for Journey’s End Keep and report,” he said. “They will need to know of this in the Second City.” “Agreed,” Gensai said, mounting his own horse and urging it back toward the path. “The commander will have to draw her own conclusions, I suppose.” “That is what commanders do,” the Lion agreed. “Come on, friend. We have to hurry.” As the two samurai spurred their horses forward into a gallop, Gensai reflected sourly that he probably was not going to get his two weeks’ leave in the immediate future. Discuss the events of this fiction in our Story Forum!
Posted on: Wed, 23 Jul 2014 11:41:54 +0000
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