She wanted them to hurry. An itch crawled along her spine, finally hovering between her shoulders. It refused to leave her. She watched the two Falcon bushi finishing their tea. They _must_ be done soon. Done and gone. They would return to their patrol across the snow, beneath the trees.

Falcon bushi. They were, evidently, patrolling their Clan's border, and had journeyed into the edge of the Shinomen. Their road would take them back into their Clan's territory.

That was, unfortunately, the same road that she travelled.

Her brother's armour bagan to chafe in the cold. It suited her, but it had never fit her. She was not her brother. Her brother was dead.

After the sun set behind the near trees, the bushi walked out of the edge of the Forest of Ghosts. One ghost followed in their footsteps, ever just out of sight.

The pale eye of the moon traced a lonely path across the night sky above, as she stooped to clear the snow from her sandals. Cold. She had not felt nights this cold since the War. She had not needed to. It reminded her of nights spent encamped, living as a soldier. A samurai. She met many samurai in the camp of Toturi the Black. The markings were there, on the trees, just as she had been told.

She had found it.

Here where the Boar Clan had died for their crimes, here where they had lived in the service of evil. The markings glowed strangely silver under the light of the moon, as if daring her to decipher their meaning.

Alone in the Twilight Mountains, a blade of stone which severed the Empire from evil, she shuddered. Below these mountains stood only death and the promise of death. To one side, a land wracked by the pain of the Dark God, a land suited only to corruption and decay. To the other side, the ruins of a race all but lost to time, a race from before the rise of men, whose people did not understand the world.

She stood between death and the promise of death, and raised a prayer to her ancestors. To her brother.

The Emperor must be found.

She played the waiting game again. "Ronin" they called her, and turned away in disgust. She wore her brother's armour and her brother's name. They had no time for ronin. They were an army, moving south. They were the Lion.

She heard only that Yoritomo had stormed ashore, crushing the Crane underfoot, threatening the Unicorn, and was marching on the throne. She heard only that there was still no word from Hiruma Castle, and that the Thunder Hida Yakamo was still lost beyond the Wall. She heard only that the Lion now had a Champion of Jade, dedicated to rooting out the taint of maho from the Empire.

She waited, but they declined to meet with her, to hear the words she carried. She was but a ronin.

She moved on, as the Lion marched south.

They tried to kill her. She knew too much and they tried to kill her, but ever and always she escaped. They began to think she was one of them. She lived. She lived, and she knew.

She told him her brother's name. The magistrate leaned down from his horse, but decided her to be too much effort for too little gain.

"Ronin" he called her, violet armour bright in the afternoon sun. She saw no peasants in the street, heard no sound of children.

She heard only that the Emperor had been found. Rescued and restored to his rightful throne. She was too late.

She left before the magistrate changed his mind. The village was as silent as death while she left.

Do not fear her, they told each other. What can she do? He is ours. They are all ours. We have won. No matter if she lives. Do not fear any of them.

Too late, she thought. Never too late. So long as the sun rose in the east, there was hope. Her brother would not surrender. His honour was her action. For her brother's honour, she would find a way.