Karasu - Raven

Prologue - The Beginning and the End

Writers note: Hello Everyone, I am sorry that I am rewriting it again and again... I should maybe do that offline, maybe not. Please do comment, as only through feedback I do learn. It is my first published story and I hope that now I have time to finally update regularly. I do apologise to everybody who has been waiting years for updates and all that, but now that I have more time in my live I will update the existing 10 chapters and continue with regular updates soon after. please bear with me and send me any feedback you have

perifee2

~~~

Both the victor

and the vanquished are

but drops of dew,

but bolts of lightning -

thus should we view the world.

Ôuchi Yoshitaka4

1507-1551

The village and estate were basked in darkness, all lanterns had been extinguished and an unusual silence hang over the area. Just above the eastern horizon a large pale red moon sickle shone like an omen for the things it had and would witness. A lone light of a burned down candle was all that was left casting long shadows on the two lone figures kneeling on the floor one staring at her hands in disbelief.

Blood covered the Tanto in her mistress hands, that lay now still in her own guiding ones. It covered the blade to the hilt and now started dripping down on her badly shaking wrists, leaving stains in the white silk below.

Suddenly a single night owls cry was heard over the land on this cloudless dark night echoing the anguish in her heart but also startling her out of her stillness. Her duty tonight was not done yet.

Akio let go and bowed a last time to her mistress who was seated before her with her knees tied up and her blood fast draining the live out of her. A faint smile played around her perfectly shaped lips as if she knew something that Akio didnt. Everything was perfectly set up from the hairpin glimmering silver in the candle light, down to the white silk with the family crest, her mistress kneeled on. Although it had been the hardest thing she every had done, assisting her mistress in her Jigai was an honor.

Shaking with tears streaming down her face, she took the blade out of her mistress hands, letting it fall into her lab while cleaning and positioning her hands perfectly according to ceremony. The blade followed after being wiped clean with the cloth, that had lain next to her. Akio positioned the Tanto in front of her Mistress Mikito Kagawe before bowing down to her one last time in a final farewell.

Akio slowly stood up still shaking but satisfied with having her duty done well. The bloodied cloth forgotten in her left hand she slowly went towards the open doors. One last look at her mistress and friend through her teary eyes was nearly harder than the ceremony had been. The single candle made her silhouette look like a dreaming girl rather than a woman, now back with her husband and ancestors.

Looking out into the garden, Akio mourned the good times she had spent with her masters. Over the beautifully landscaped garden lay an eerie silence when Akio walked towards the back wall, in a slow defeated march. The lone stone table set still with the Igo set on it, she reached first. Just two days ago they still had been playing. It seemed to Akio like a lifetime ago now. She walked slowly to the pieces on the board and put them back into the containers. Nobody would finish the match now. One black and one white piece she took and placed them into her inro, where already the jade hairpin resided, her mistress had given her as a gift. The board she left set, it didnt matter to her at all. Out of habit Akio avoided the beautiful arranged sand of the Zen area before she crossed the koi pond looking unseeingly forward, not noticing the occupants at all.