D3: EM: Congee and throwing sticks (Expecting)

[Kaikoga Koi]

Koi smiled warmly, a blush appearing on her throat and cheek as she watch Yasu for a moment with fondness. "It is a pleasure, I knew the moment that we met I needed to give you this gift. You were on my mind for a while after our meeting, you were perhaps the nicest conversation I had since arriving in this miai."

She now took a moment to sip her tea as she listened to Yasu, there was a moment that shame crossed her mind and filled her vision. She felt a hand settle on her stomach almost protectively, like it held some secret that was hidden away from the world. "I see, yes that might be a possibility in the future should I find a partner that wishes to have children should I be provided a wife."

You stupid, pathetic, ungrateful girl! You offer nothing to this family! You are nothing, weak, a fake and fraud. You hold no honour to your clan and duty! SHAME ON YOU! Koi heard a voice scream in the back of her mind as she remembered what came next, the heavy blows of a bokken across her back and stomach - the damages that can be caused - the night she left. The fever afterwards, and being saved by the ronin. June....

Can I?

You never know...

The Monk said it was unlikely...but not impossible...

Koi almost looked ashamed, and looked at her tarot cards purely to distract herself from this topic. "I will admit, Yasu-san I have never looked into my future through divination I purely focus on others and their needs. I do not mind the unpredictability of not know what my future will be so I have never divined myself through my cards or at least haven't done it for years since learning how too. But I do dream of a family, and sprawling hills with a pond. I enjoy working with my hands, building, fishing and creating pretty much anything that I can. Perhaps, if I am lucky I do dream of little girls.."

Koi thought for a moment. "Would you grant me a divination, perhaps?"

[Kuni Yasu]

"Ah well, it easy to have nice conversations when folk are so pleasant," the Kuni deflects a bit as she opens the kit, admiring the tidy pastes and powders with an abashed smile. "I guess there's reasons visitors down there might be more guarded and curt than they are here, though." There's a satisfying 'click' to the wood as she closes it to tuck away lest they spill tea on it. "You know, I don't think I've ever *had* normal makeup before. They're going to be fascinating to experiment with."

At the request, she smiles and nods once. "I can understand that, I've done the small divinations where you look at how pomegranate pips settle in tea at the harvest moon kinds of peasant stuff for myself, but it's harder to read a full casting when your own thoughts are in the way of what it's trying to say." She'll open the little tin and hold it to tip the contents into Koi's hands. "Shake them a bit so they know you."

There are two metal coins and one of bone, a tiny bird skull carved of a fine black wood, two small seashells-one an open fan, the other a tight coil, and three small vertebrae. All have symbols on them-carved in or raised, some painted and a bit worn.

When she's passed them over, she leans to hold her hand out into the rain from beneath the awning, returning to trace a damp circle on the rough, wooden table, and three symbols within it. One resembles an eye. Those with some theological training recognize another as a common element of scrying invocations and the other as protective.

[Kaikoga Koi]

Koi held out her hands inspecting each piece curiously as she quickly added a comment about the make up. "It is mixture of my normal blends but it's also designed to hold when its wet as I use the same blend for my theatrical make up. It's made by a retired priestess in my town, she has very bad arthritis in her hands but the making of the makeup is just astounding. If you enjoy it, and need more send me a message and I will happily ensure to send you more."

Koi watched the Kuni with curiousity, her own mind walking through her steps as a process. She lightly shook the items firmly, she knew how most people did a scrying and always the way some folks shook items was always something people commented about when they gossiped later.

"Is this something you learned from your Clan, or something you've figured out along the way?" She asked softly, curiously and after an appropriate amount of time she looked at Yasu. "Do you wish them back or me to cast them?"

[Kuni Yasu]

Yasu nods with grateful smile, filing away the note about the makeup maker. Perhaps eventually that would be a journey to make if the crafter was at all interested in passing along some techniques.

"Go ahead and make the cast. I find it better if I don't have too much of the feel of them when trying to read for someone else." She sips her tea. "It's a bit of both. One of my mothers came to the Kuni from the Isawa, so I've learned from them both. There's very little that's contradictory between the traditions."

"The bits have accumulated over the years. Some are gifted, some found, some made." She keeps her hands clear of the evaporating damp on the table.

[Kaikoga Koi]

Koi nodded warmly before casting the objects where she knew it was good to cast them cradling her hands at the edge of the table just in case they decided they wanted to fall off.

Koi smiled warmly. "I see. I was inclined to divination froma young age, my Grandmother began to teach me before I started education but I was always attuned to it."

[Kuni Yasu]

"I'm never entirely sure if I'm truly attuned to the shifts of fate, she says, examining the pieces and the spread of their scatter on the table."

She considers the pair of shells, that have landed nestled on atop the other. "Water flowing underground. Lots of creativity as a resource, but hidden." Frowning a bit at the coins she notes, "These are a bit martial for a miai, but I guess there's certainly something like conflict or planning...A lot of chaos to organize...So much to work with, but you're going to have to sort through it all to make things run right, I think."

"That fits the elements as well. A welling spring, needs direction and some order that earth tends to bring, neh?"

The little skull, tumbled on its side near the protective marking. "The protection of ancestors or old spirits perhaps, or even the memory of those who are gone for whatever reason. Something thinks you need a bit of guarding, while the bones are all ascatter. Can't settle the future without bringing the present into alignment." Yasu nods. "That fits well with the broader trend, doesn't it? It can also mean tragedy, war tearing everything apart. But that doesn't seem like the right read at a miai, does it?"

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https://divination.com/iching/lookup/7-2/ Organized Discipline/Army: for the image
https://www.cafeausoul.com/reading?lns=878888

[Kaikoga Koi]

Koi sat for a while inspecting the pieces, and listened to the information provided by Yasu-san. She seemed genuinely curious leaning over to inspect, and smile. As her fortune is presented though Koi goes quiet, she seemed conflicted in how to reply feeling that the potential meaning of the words hold something to the woman as she smiled nodding.

"I never feel like I am, do not worry you do well your technique is very interesting." She said softly. "It is always surprising when someone else does it. But that is an interesting read, I enjoyed that and I shall take that consideration." She chuckled.

I need earth, huh. She found herself thinking taking a sip of her tea, as she considered the cards more. Shame, if it were you I would hold some hope. She placed her cup down and chuckled. "Thank you for that reading, it is not something I am traditionally use to as I rarely ever get my reading done."

[Kuni Yasu]

"Same, really. I mean, I read for myself, but that's different, isn't it?" She gathers the bits and pieces of her kit together. "For yourself, it's more...letting the divination help organize things you know and set up connections that will..hmm..spark something when you run across it. Like offering your future self a bit of advice."

She looks to the cards, questioningly. "Honestly, you've already given me a gift, I hate do ask for more." So she doesn't, precisely, leaving things open for the Moth to decide.

[Kaikoga Koi]

Koi smiled warmly taking the chance to eat a bun after saying the usual thanks for the food. The warmth and streaming flavour of the beans fills her with a deep satisfied sigh. "Oh those are good!"

Koi nodded. "I try to go for a walk in the morning and that helps work things out in my brain. Divination for me is very much work related so I have a hard time seperating them from one another." She chuckled. "Plus, I think I know what the ancestors will tell me...you are fat.." She wasnt. "...You were too much make up..." She doesnt. "When are you going to give me grandchildren.." She joked playfully. "I dont know, knowing the future scares me a little." She admitted.

Koi waved her statement away. "This isnt a gift, this is practice and learning to develop my technique. Trust me, its fine.."

She lifted up the wooden box, removed the deck of cards that were long and thin. Each painted simply black and white with gold highlighted areas. Each showing a Fortune some lesser known ones too.

Koi shuffled the deck, using the chance to put on a small show with the cards rolling them and flicking one entirely seperate from the deck, all as a way to impress the Kuni before she placed the deck down. "Please shuffle them 13 times, split it twice and shuffle again. Focus on yourself, an emotion or situation. Something meaningful to you. Focus on that as clear as you can. Painting in your mindscape and associate it to yourself."

Koi said softly at the end. "When you are done. Split in half again, turn one half upside down and reshuffle once more. Then place them in mu hand."

[Kuni Yasu]

So early into things, of course the miai was really the primary thing on Yasu's mind. The people she'd met and connections she'd made. She doesn't ask questions as she shuffles, just focuses on the miai, even if it made her feel a bit juvenile, like tossing chestnuts on hot coals at the full moon and seeing if the cracks on their shells resembled some kanji or other that would hint at their future husbands' names.

She thinks of each person and meeting, the pair of Otter, her Matsu friend and his Kitsu cousin, the giant Crane and uncultured Phoenix, and of course the Moth in front of her. Splitting and shuffling, flipping and shuffling..before setting them gently in Kois palm